Goal and Objectives:

Goal:
To connect the Wooster community in understanding by interpreting the stories and concerns of all

Objectives in Order of Importance:
1 – To Write Interpretation Honestly and with Understanding
2 – To Simplify and Make the Complex Accessible
3 – To Speak for Those that Wish to be Heard
4 – To Build Understanding Between Different Sections of the Community

Why this order of priority?
If I can be Trustworthy and make the complex Accessible and Speak for others but I can’t build bridges, I will be content.
If I can be Trustworthy and make the complex Accessible but can never reach all that wish to be heard, I will be disappointed but will have done a service.
If I can be Trustworthy but I can do nothing else, I will have at least done no damage.

History:

I honestly don’t know how I got here.
In 2021 I joined the neighborhood focused social media Nextdoor.
In 2022 I became politically involved in the school district building plan of the time.
In 2023 I helped lead community opposition to the school levy voted on that spring.
I was an activist, biased, and aggressive in my promotion.
Right before the election I began to worry about the damage the levy was doing to the relationship between the school district and the community.
After the election, I lined up an interview with the schools superintendent.
With his help and answers I wrote a piece on how the community would move forward with the schools while answering community questions and concerns I had heard during the levy campaign of 2023.
I reached out to Wooster Weekly News and they worked with me to get the piece published.

From mid 2023 on, I accidentally found myself doing long form pieces on Nextdoor.
Some were personal, some were technical, but all were community focused.
I slowly developed an awareness of the community and the different concerns and events within it.
I found issues that were complicated.
I found community members that didn’t have an easy voice.
I found wholesome events I just wanted people to know about.
I increasingly wanted to reconnect a community that I feel had become divided with walls and misunderstandings.

In 2025 this habit continued to Facebook and local Wooster groups.
By then I had found that community members appreciated the pieces that I posted, even if they were rather long.
But there were always problems with both Nextdoor and Facebook.
I couldn’t embed pictures to help explain an example, I had character length restrictions, and in the end I didn’t have good control on the platforms.
That is why I decided to start the Wooster Interpreter site.