“The one true democracy we have is storytelling. It goes across borders, boundaries, genders, wealth, race — everyone has a story to tell.”

– Narrative 4 Cofounder & President, Colum McCann

Founded in 2013 by Lisa Consiglio and bestselling author Colum McCann, Narrative 4 is a global nonprofit that seeks to remedy fractured community and civic spaces through structured workshops and immersive storytelling experiences that cultivate an intentional practice of deep listening, empathy, curiosity, and leadership skills.

Narrative 4’s hallmark program is the Story Exchange. While the exercise is relatively simple—participants are paired to share a true story from their lives based on prompts, then are guided to retell their partner’s story in the first person in front of a larger group—its impact is extraordinarily deep. The intentional practice helps participants from wide-ranging backgrounds see one another as whole and complex beings, not as a “single story”, a stereotype, or a representative of one. This nonpartisan approach creates curiosity and empathy for the “other,” bridging divides to foster community and institutional well-being. And this program can be customized to feature guest speakers—past campus events have featured bestselling authors and pivotal Narrative 4 figures McCann and Ishmael Beah—building continuity between the two experiences.

Narrative 4 has run their signature Story Exchange programs in classrooms, boardrooms, and common rooms in over 35 countries. They’ve amassed over 500 school partnerships in the last decade, fostering meaningful conversations between students at every grade level and through varied departments including First Year and Residence Life programs, Academic Affairs departments, employee resource groups, and many others. Recent events found them at campuses as diverse in size and character as New York University, Vanderbilt University, Marquette University, Seton Hill University, Trinity College, the University of Tennessee, and the University of St. Thomas, where they have successfully brought campus populations together to have constructive dialogues about difficult subjects—even issues as charged as the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.

In an era of intractable gridlock and demonization—where the inability to compromise or identify with people outside of one’s ideological bubble has become all too common in our communities, our campuses, in Congress, and elsewhere—Narrative 4’s programs are designed to lay the foundation for building connection and collaboration across differences, as well as to combat widespread feelings of isolation, polarization, and hopelessness. The impact of Narrative 4’s transformative work in educational settings is well-documented through research conducted with the University of Chicago, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Yale University.

Lyceum Agency partners with Narrative 4 to make its programs available to schools, companies, and communities around the nation. Narrative 4’s trained staff can facilitate Story Exchanges directly and also train students, staff, and community leaders to become facilitators themselves and carry these lifelong communication skills to an even broader audience.

Narrative 4’s work is urgently needed. If we are to move forward collectively as a country we must invest in these essential communication skills—to truly listen, to actively empathize, to be curious and ask questions, to consider the responses—so that we can cultivate the next generation of leaders who can forge meaningful connection across differences.

More information can be found at narrative4.com.