An Interview with Kymberly Byrd
In this interview with former Vital Village staff member, Kymberly Byrd, we discuss asset-based partnerships, how the Vital Village philosophy has impacted her own life, and how she hopes to carry the work forward.
Kymberly Byrd has been the Project Manager for the Vital Village Network for the past two and a half years. She recently left Boston to pursue her Ph.D. in Community Research and Action at Vanderbilt University. In this interview, we discuss asset-based partnerships, how the Vital Village philosophy has impacted her own life, and how she hopes to carry the work forward.
What is an asset-based approach?
For me, asset-based thinking is moving beyond what society sees as assets. That’s the first step. As a society, we often look at assets in terms of money, degree obtainment, very materialistic things. For me, asset-based thinking is shifting to less tangible things – like passion, drive, perseverance. Those types of assets are harder to measure but they are essential to sustaining the work.
How does that fit in with how social scientists typically define assets?
In social science research, people often think of asset-based approach in very tangible ways: number of partners, institutional resources. That’s important because you need tangible things to push work forward, but again, often the things that drive success in our communities are not so obvious. We have means, but maybe not in a way a researcher would expect. I think the hard part as a researcher is that you want to find things that you can share and report out, but if you’re looking for assets, you have to look for them. You’re not going to do an in-and-out, one-time intervention and understand what makes a community strong.
When I think about assets in my community I think about how many hours I’ve seen people volunteer, how I see people take care of their neighbors’ children. I think about all of the motivation and gifts people have that I can’t see immediately, but that ultimately will create our work. If our communities don’t have something, we can ask why, but we can also push past that to ask what we do have.
Do you think it is ever useful to focus on deficits or injustices? How does taking a social justice lens complement an asset-based approach?
Well, I think that understanding what the injustices are actually helps you to see how people are fighting, and the strength people have built just to maintain themselves. If I live in a city where it’s very difficult for me to navigate my child’s school system, my ability to work through that process, my ability to get by in a different way is an asset. It’s unfortunate that we sometimes have to work ten times as hard to get twice as far, but we have to and we do. There’s a narrative around some of our neighborhoods that parents are disengaged or kids aren’t working hard, but if you look at what people are actually doing in those communities to get by and to thrive -- that’s where you can see so many assets. We know parents are engaged, we see volunteers at our schools, we have the Vital Village Community Partnership. Once you actually look, we can push past that narrative of disengagement and move beyond blaming individuals.
Another point is that once you start looking at the assets – all the innovative steps parents are organizing for to get basic services – it helps you understand the gaps. Why do parents have to take an hour and a half to get to work in Boston and not in Newton? Often the things we’re doing, we shouldn’t have to be doing.
It sounds like you do think it can be useful to focus on deficits at times.
You should still think about deficits, but deficits as systemic problems, not as individual ones. It’s one thing to see inequity, but not to see people as deficits. That can really shift the narrative and really shift how you think about a “problem”. Just re-framing the question about violence in Boston from “why are more black males engaged in crime?” to “what are the employment opportunities for black men?” or “why did someone see committing a crime as a constructive solution to a problem?”
What projects have you worked on that really shift the narrative towards assets?
For the past months, I’ve been working with community development corporations to align housing, financial well-being, and mental health resources. Working with these organizations to bring mental health into that space has been very powerful.
We worked with small focus groups to show the “Mask You Live In,” a documentary that talks about toxic socialization patterns for men and ways to create countercultural spaces. Then many of the men shared their own stories, their own thoughts about their masculinity, or the healthy norms that already exist in their own family. Men of color are often reduced to certain labels, so to create that opportunity where they could open up, share their feelings, and connect with others felt very special. We were strangers coming in, so it highlighted to me that people want those kinds of spaces and want to be seen as complete individuals with complex lives.
It sounds like you’ve really applied asset-based thinking to your own life and own relationships.
Yes, it’s been huge!
Do you have a favorite memory from Vital Village?
I don’t know if I have a favorite memory exactly. It’s more a compilation of things. Just being able to bring myself into my job, having the space to innovate and create. Non-profit work looks different wherever you go, but this is a very unique space. We celebrate relationships here in a really intentional way, we see community differently and we are really focused on just creating space for new partnerships to emerge. A lot of people can’t handle that fluidity in their professional life – they need a timeline or a checklist. We just really allow for life to happen, opportunities to arise, relationships to blossom.
Working here has inspired me to see people differently, and to envision my future differently. What I aspire to now is not conventional. I can’t define it and package it. I don’t want to be put in a researcher box or an activist box, so being in a space that has sometimes felt so ambiguous and dynamic has been exciting.
I came into this work very type A, and well, I am still type A. But so much of my being has been transformed by the nature of our work.
What are you most excited about in the future?
I’m excited to go to a place where I feel like the spirit of Vital Village will be present. I was worried that I would go to Vanderbilt and lose that energy. The people I’ve met so far there have been really inspiring; I’ve gotten a sense of their conviction, their passion, their radical thinking, and their humility. To be with a group of people who share so many of my values, but also work in really diverse fields and regions of the world is invigorating too. Students and professors in my program study urban development in Panama, the intersections of disability & race, land justice, all these different fields. Just being in the South will also be different and new. Resources look different there, injustices and values look different there. Vanderbilt is radical but it exists in a much more conservative space. That’s a new dynamic that I’m looking forward to exploring.
Is there any Vital Village project that you will really carry forward with you?
Urban College of Boston – working with the students in the Community Advocacy course was just an incredible experience. Education is generally this very top-down experience, not a cooperative one based on mutual learning. Because we didn’t go in with a pre-existing list of skills or assumptions about what advocacy should look like, we were able to really hear what people were already doing in their own lives. For me, having the opportunity to validate the beauty and the strength that they already exhibit as individuals – that was really powerful and special. A few of my students have since asked for me to keep in touch and for me to be a mentor. I’ve learned so much from them and I’m so moved to be able to continue growing with that group of people.
Is there anything else you want to say?
I just appreciate Vital Village – everyone, the family – for the investment and the passion and the tangible energy that people commit. Showing up and showing out is very powerful and very rare, honestly. The level of energy and engagement that we see here is not common. I know we’ll continue to grow, but I feel privileged to have been a part of it for this two and a half years.