A CONVERSATION WITH: SHEWANA
This blog is part of our series, A Conversation WITH. As a media organization, we highlight members of our team - past and present - that have done awesome work with Wide Angle, while also pursuing their own creative goals.
Shewana Skinner - she/her pronouns - is a Wide Angle Board Member and Chair of the Business Advisory Committee, with an interesting Covid-19 experience that connects to her passion for supporting Wide Angle. She is an Intellectual Property lawyer in Washington DC specializing in Patent Law and Founder of SDOT Solutions LLC a management consulting firm providing Service, Delivery, Operations and Technology solutions to small businesses. Shewana is a graduate of Howard University School of Law in Washington D.C., and holds a B.S. in Industrial Engineering from North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University in Greensboro, N.C. And she has a 7 year old fur baby named Prince Rogers Nelson (named after her favorite artist).
Current read: The Code of the Extraordinary Mind by Vishen Lakhiani
Song on repeat: Gospel Songs - especially the Mary Mary Two Women Pandora Playlist
Favorite spot in Baltimore: Shewana is based in DC but loves Sweet 27
Tell me more about the music you are listening to.
[The gospel songs] keep me in good spirits. Recently I’ve started getting back into, not necessarily a religion, but more spirituality. Not out of fear, out of an awareness. The business opportunities I have been given since Covid-19 reminded me there is a power greater than I working in my favor. The opportunities not only helped me save some friends from unemployment it also saved me. I attribute that to that power.
What business opportunities have you been given since Covid-19?
I created SDOT Solutions LLC and one service I provide is project and contract management. I’m working with a client, Clean City, LLC, to provide Covid-19 cleaning and disinfecting for the government as well as private businesses and construction sites. With that, I have a certified team that comes together. We provide them with the proper Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). We also have the EPA approved disinfectant products, we have sprayers, spray bottles, electrostatic sprayers, foggers - all the bells and whistles I guess you could say and we are contracted to go in and clean areas where there are suspected or confirmed cases of Covid-19. With this, I’ve been able to employ a few friends and family that have had to file for unemployment due to the business they were working at being closed. That’s been a blessing to be able to provide.
How else has your work pivoted since Covid-19?
There’s a chart a friend of mine put on FB (see below). It’s these different zones: fear, learning, and growth. I have been consciously trying to work in the growth zone. The growth zone talks about living with purpose, thinking of others and how to help them. I live in a condo community. There are a lot of elderly people here and since we are right by a hospital there are a lot of people that work in the medical field. I started a condo community outreach program. If you’re elderly and you need someone to get groceries for you, you can sign up. For essential workers who have to leave their home and their children are home because schools are closed, I connected them with teachers in the community and set up mini daycares where they can learn. There’s a common thread in my work. I try to put myself in the position to be of service and that’s how I even got involved with Wide Angle.
Source: Unknown
Why did you choose to work with Wide Angle?
Two and a half years ago I went to the November showcase and saw all of the amazing work the students created. I view media arts as a way to give these young people a voice and to define what Baltimore is instead of allowing outsiders to define it and give us a lens of what Baltimore is instead of what we see on television. It’s a very powerful tool and the fact that these students are being given this tool that they can use as a catalyst for success. We see how influential media is in the world. Here are tools they can be given to be extremely successful and if I can be a part of that in one way or another, shaping the policies to support them, I was happy to do that.
My mother is a single mother who had me at 17, never graduated from high school. However, she always nurtured my dreams and put me in programs that supported my future. So now to have an engineering degree and a law degree and successful businesses from programs that I grew up with that supported me in the way that Wide Angle is supporting the youth in Baltimore - it's one of those things I’m proud to be a part of.
What is the best part of what you do and what gives you energy?
The community outreach program, that’s beyond satisfying being able to help the seniors in my community. Treating it more like a village, getting to know neighbors that you just speak to in passing. Actually getting to know them better, becoming more of a community because we’re actually out here helping each other. It’s wonderful to see how many people are willing to help - you just have to ask them. People coming together - that’s been my favorite thing about what’s happening. It’s very tragic what’s going on but just seeing how people are stepping up for one another is a beautiful thing. It’s my hope that after this we will start looking at each other and speaking and being more compassionate and empathetic about where people are in their lives and not being so judgemental. Most of us are in the same place, we are in this together.
How do you unplug?
I’m an urban gardener. And I’ve been using the herbs (lavender, chamomile, mint, basil) to make oils and tinctures and I started making CBD teas. I’m thinking about making it a business lol. But for now, I’m really into those types of things to relax. I do enjoy gardening quite a bit. So being able to grow the garden and then make the tea is my happy place. And weekend virtual happy hours to connect with friends.
Describe WAYM in one word.
Visionary pops in my head. I believe that it gives students the opportunity to be visionaries. To give their vision through their lens of their lives of what Baltimore is.
Is there anything else that you want to share?
One more thing about Wide Angle. As I said before, I joined because I saw the great opportunity to help the youth support their dreams for a brighter future. But there are other organizations with supportive missions closer to home I could have joined. So the question is why do I stay with Wide Angle despite the traffic I always get stuck in having to drive from DC to Baltimore lol? I stay because it is an organization that serves a demographic of primarily black and brown people but is not led by said demographic, so my perspective is needed, welcomed and honestly appreciated. I stay because, unIike other organizations, I know everyone in the room is there with a sincere desire to support. I stay because everyone in the room has a desire to understand and face their biases so that they can not only become better support for the youth but also better humans. I stay because the Dream is that one day we will not be judged by the color of our skin but by the content of our character. And everyone in that room shares that dream for themselves and our youth.
MEET THE AUTHOR
Hannah Shaw is the Communications Specialist at WAYM. She is a multidisciplinary designer and received her BS in Marketing from UMD and MA in Social Design from MICA.