My name is Kai Trotz-Motayne and I am currently going into my final semester at 69热视频 and will soon be completing my degree in a Joint Honours History and African Studies with a double minor in Political Science and Communications. I know, it is a mouthful, but it has taken me a long time to finally end up with this somewhat complicated degree. Though I have learnt so much in my four years, coming to the end of my degree has left me with a big question: What do I want to do after school? Though it may seem as an obvious question, it is a very hard one to answer. I feel passionate about non-profit work, the arts, media, and increasingly so working within my community (Black, Caribbean, Latin American, and/or Immigrant communities). Before this summer I did not know realistically how I could experience all of these different interests within one workplace. As someone from Toronto, who grew up going to dance classes in Regent Park, who is a film-fanatic, it seemed as if the opportunity to intern at Regent Park Film Festival came at the perfect time.
Going into this internship, there was a great deal I wanted to learn. Perhaps going in blind left me with very little expectations of what to expect. I have never worked in an organization with such a defined statement of purpose, objective, and long history in the city. Truly going into the internship, I just wanted to learn everything. I wanted to know how the organization worked, how they got funding, how they organized themselves, and how they chose what movies to show. I think this was a great internship for a curious person like me. Although I had a defined role as social media/marketing intern, my job was also quite flexible. Moreover, in a meeting with Angela (the head of RPFF) she urged me to reach out to others in the organization who I am interested in speaking with. Beyond this, however, the people at RPFF work as a team, and the weekly meetings gave me an idea of everyone鈥檚 roles and what they were doing.
My role consisted of creating graphics, updating and posting on social media, and writing weekly copies. In our first meeting, the team let me know of the particular challenges they had last year when they were forced to go online. Firstly, they noticed that they needed a better social media and website platform. Secondly, they noticed that to work remotely they needed to better their organization. Although I had run social media accounts before, I have never done anything of this caliber. In this job I truly learned the importance of organization and planning. In particular, I learned how to use and depend on the applications Hootsuite, Asana, and Keela which basically organized my entire summer tasks. We would have weekly team meetings and then weekly marketing meetings. It is interesting how social media that I saw as so casual is in fact so planned out. From my onboarding process to the day I left, I will still be astounded by how organized the entire space is. Craig, Operations Manager, took much of the time in COVID to organize all of the Google folders. As a person who often lacks organization, I think it was a great learning period for me not only to learn how to organize but also to see how it is truly beneficial.
Like everyone else, COVID has been very difficult and the world we live in completely changed. I would say my greatest hurdle was working from home. In the beginning of the internship, it made me feel disconnected. Especially me being a social person, the remote working made it difficult for me to really understand that I was working even though I was at home. The issue was only made worse with the large heat wave in Montreal which left me laying on the ground and working half the day. Despite my negative feelings towards working from home, I must say that the staff at RPFF truly made it a worthwhile experience and truly tried to integrate and make people feel connected. During my first few days I had to have 1:1 with everyone in the organization so I could get to know them more. Also, my advisor was on google chat all day and checked in on me. Towards the end of my internship, they were contemplating the idea of moving to in office and decided to have a final meeting at our Toronto Outdoor Picture Show Event. I would have liked to attend, but my personal circumstances prevented me from attending. Although I never met anyone in the flesh this summer, it was nice to know I can always go back and visit.
It was an interesting experience learning about what the Regent Park Film Festival really did. Sure, they put on an annual festival. But, beyond that, they do regular programming and community work to provide opportunities and new experiences for people within the neighborhood. As Toronto鈥檚 longest-running, free community festival in Canada鈥檚 oldest public housing neighborhood, RPFF defines itself as a non-profit cultural and educational media arts organization. More than that, I would say it is a staple of the community. Regent Park is an area I have known since I was a child. As I have gotten older, I have seen the demographics drastically changed in terms of wealth and ethnicity. For many working-class communities, art and culture are not presented to them as accessible. So many of Toronto鈥檚 film festivals and museums are at least 30 minutes away from this neighborhood and cost so much. There are two things that stood out to me as integral to RPFF. To begin with, It is accessible through both its location in the community. A second thing about RPFF that I found so important and particularly empowering as a black woman, is that it is run entirely by people of color. I think people's lived experience made them both increasingly empathetic and thoughtful when looking for ways to navigate issues that would arise. I think particularly in the context of Toronto, a place I happily call home, so many of these art spaces are not filled by people that look like me and I think it made me drift away from an area of work I have always been so passionate about. The fact that Shafia, Craig, Aashna, and Angela (all people of color) are running a film festival makes me hopeful that young kids in Regent Park can look to them and feel seen and inspired.
