Alternative learning communities is something I have been very interested in lately, as an activist, artist and international student from Nigeria, living in the west. I think it is interesting to look at alternative communities of learning not only as spaces of education and resistance to dominant authorities, but also as spaces of extreme empowerment that allow from greater freedoms and connection by those who participate in the learning community. Moreover, it prompts me to think about the conditions under which these alternative practices arise. Yes it is out of dissatisfaction which the status quo, but when you think about it more deeply, in order for these new learning Practices and communities to arise there had to already have been an awareness of alternatives. So I don’t view these communities or alternative practices as giving people access to knew knowledge or allowing them to pursue new knowledge, but rather it enables their already existing awareness to thrive and develop understandings outside the scope of the dominant authorities