Hello from Boise, Idaho! My name is Julie Fanselow, and I have been working with the Study Circles Resource Center since 2002, mainly writing stories about communities that have successfully used study circles to create positive change.I'll still be writing stories for SCRC, but now I am also managing our new blog, DemocracySpace.org? (As many of you know, SCRC will soon change its name to Everyday Democracy.)

I am posting something on DemSpace pretty much every weekday. We want to highlight stories of and opportunities for public dialogue, deliberation, and action wherever they are happening. So far, I have had posts on study circles in Australia, the DREAM Act, the 50th anniversary of integration at Little Rock Central High School, blogs from Horizons communities (working to fight poverty in the Upper Midwest, Plains, and Northwest), public officials who blog, the controversial new book "The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet is Killing Our Culture," the TV show "Aliens in America," and much more.

We also plan special events - called "water coolers" - about once a month, where you'll be able to ask questions of people involved in citizen engagement. The first one is next week, Thursday, October 11, at 1 p.m. Eastern/noon Central/11 a.m. Mountain/10 a.m. Pacific, right at DemocracySpace.org. Since it is election season, we'll be talking about how citizen engagement has been used to defuse hot-button electoral issues.I welcome your ideas, contributions, and comments.

If you have news, you can send it to me at [email protected]. If you'd like to make a guest post on our blog, let me know, and we will make it happen. Thanks to NCDD for giving us this way to meet and network online.