Taking to the streets is homework from master activist

Kennedy School fellow Ron Bell collects signatures in Harvard Square.

Her pitch was simple.

"Do you have a favorite vegetable?" Lauren Walker, a junior at Providence College in Rhode Island, asked passersby on Massachusetts Avenue early this month. Then, following up with a clipboard and a petition, she reeled in the support, imploring, "Help us grow community gardens in Massachusetts."

To the pedestrians roaming Harvard Square, it was little more than an appeal on behalf of urban agriculture. To the participants, it was another strand in a web of activism stretching from César Chávez to Barack Obama.

Walker and the 100 other budding activists were trying to forge relationships out of common interests, as part of a lesson in community organizing led by Marshall Ganz, a Harvard University lecturer who earned his credentials in the fields and streets of this country.

The daylong workshop was a primer for his course, "People, Power and Change," which he has offered at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government since 1994. It has spread to five other New England colleges, including Providence, where it is overseen by former Kennedy students.

Harvard students in the course meet twice a week in the classroom. As part of the work, they have to complete an organizing project in which they either develop their own campaign or volunteer with a campus organization or a community group in Boston.

"It's a great way to engage people in some pretty exciting kinds of learning values," the 64-year-old Ganz said in an interview. "They can be a source of not just feeling good, but doing effective work."

Ganz, who grew up in California, left Harvard during his junior year in 1964 so he could volunteer in Mississippi during the civil rights movement.

He didn't return until he was invited to his class reunion in 1990.

But in the midst of that 36-year absence from academia, Ganz gained first-hand experience that he would later translate into the classroom.

In 1965, he started as a labor organizer with Chávez at the United Farm Workers union. He stayed with the group for 16 years before leaving to concentrate on the California Democratic Party, where he helped develop voter-mobilization strategies for local and national candidates.

Many of the concepts behind grassroots organizing that Ganz promoted on the West Coast have since become staples for political operatives. Former Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean and current candidate Obama have tried to build communities of volunteers, drawn together by similar motivations, political interests or beliefs.

Ganz has had a hand in each campaign and recently spent time training Obama campaign workers in California about the strategies he used in the state nearly two decades ago.

In 1991, Ganz picked up where he had left off at Harvard and completed his degree in history and government. He was awarded a master's degree in public administration from the Kennedy School in 1993 and received a doctorate in sociology in 2000.

His course on organizing came together at the suggestion of a school official. Many of his students have sought full-time labor and community organizing jobs after graduation, he said, including four who are teaching fellows in the class this semester. Harvard also accepted eight local activists who were enrolled in the course for free.

Ganz said students come from a range of backgrounds, but overall they "combine a critical eye with a hopeful heart, and I think that's what it takes to be drawn into social change."

The nonprofit Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Development Corporation, founded in 1977 to create housing for low-income residents, has recruited a student from the course to plan meetings about zoning, housing, transportation, and open space for Jackson Square revitalization.

"The students have a great opportunity by having something real to work with, and then for the community it's a good addition," said Juan Gonzalez, the community organizer for the group. "In some cases, you need a different perspective."

Gonzalez, who spent seven years in a similar role with the Allston-Brighton Community Development Corporation, said he has had good results from past interns from the program.

Groups that hit the pavement for their causes during the Feb. 9 training session came together after students discussed what they were interested in, first in pairs and then with the entire class. They had less than a half hour to formulate a campaign before heading to Harvard Square.

Besides their pitch for community gardens, Walker and her group of three offered free face painting for the kids while encouraging grownups to push state legislators for additional funding.

A few minutes after they had set up shop, Paul Holbrook signed the petition, admitting, "I was drawn in by the approach."