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While some organizers refer to “training,” we prefer to talk about organizing education. We take a comprehensive, power-building approach. As “Bernard the Famous” says “We train horses. We educate people.”
We take a participatory education approach to all workshops. Our job is not to tell people things, but to create exercises, interaction, provocative discussion and opportunities to build relationships.
There’s no “sage on a stage” here.
Each session is bespoke for your staff, volunteers, members or activists. From Organizing 101 to in-depth campaign strategy workshops, we help activists build power and win campaigns. They’ll build their own leadership and discover that they know more than they think they do.
Leaders of Innovate Public Schools Community Organizer Training Program (COTP) needed a facilitator and curriculum designer who could bring a new perspective. After several years of online-only sessions, leaders wanted to jump start the program for a new era.
The sessions Mira designed and facilitated brought experiences from union organizing, feminist action, gun violence prevention, political campaigns and education justice.
Post-session surveys consistently showed Mira was a favorite facilitator.
Virginia Interfaith Power and Light (VAIPL) leaders wanted to build on the organization’s strong reputation for advocacy and lobbying to create an organizing culture. The executive director’s vision is to build power in local communities all over Virginia to set the environmental justice agenda in the state.
With a diverse staff by age, education, racial identity, geography and experience, the program had to be accessible for many people.
To get started, Mira designed a program of six workshops, from Organizing 101 to Organizing Strategy Development. A coaching session followed each workshop to help organizers apply what they’d learned.
She also designed and facilitated an organizing strategy refresher, additional coaching sessions and a repository of organizing resources.
WEPOWER St. Louis needed a strong campaign simulation to kickoff their Chisholm’s Chair fellowship. The goals included inspiring Black and Latine women to run campaigns and run for office themselves.
Mira designed and facilitated a six-session virtual campaign simulation for the first Chisholm’s Chair class. The series started with an initial “making the decision to run” session, followed by workshops on raising money, comms, digital and field strategy as well as campaign design. And, just like real life, a surprise crisis for participants to navigate.
Sessions were designed to introduce concepts of campaign strategy, with exercises so participants could apply the skills and tactics in their own context.
Since the series, one member became a visible leader in her community and ran for mayor. Another currently serves as a St. Louis city alderwoman.
Two of Mira’s proposals were accepted during the highly competitive Netroots Nation selection process.
She co-facilitated “Unpacking Bias and Depolarizing Race and Class,” online. Participants discovered some of their own implicit biases and discussed strategies to overcome them.
During “Someone Always Calls the Cops: When Karen or Chad Dials 911 on Your Canvassers,” Mira led participants through discussions and strategies for protecting canvassers of color in white neighborhoods.
This workshop led to significant brainstorming about ways to reduce the harm and danger in the first place. If you would like to partner on trying out some of these solutions, please get in touch!
