Community Organizing: Becoming a Change Agent

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Competencies

In this eighth session of DC Advocacy Partners will:

  • Identify strategies for beginning and sustaining grassroots level organizing around specific issues.
  • Understand the role of and how to use the media to effectively promote their issues.
  • Identify mechanisms to promote cooperation and coalition building that will result in combined strength to influence public policy more effectively.
  • Be able to identify how to recruit individual supporters for community organization.

Agenda

WordPDF

Speakers

Jim Dickson, American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD)

Jennifer Matson, Public Affairs Manager, DC Vote

Amy Feinberg, Operations and Member Services Manager, TASH

Community Organizing Organizations and Online Resources

WordPDF

Handouts

Disability Issues: Organizing Community Support
From the Independent Living InstituteDC Vote

  • About DC Vote – PDF
  • 10 Myths about DC – WordPDF
  • Congressional Interference and the Denial of Democracy in Washington, DC – WordPDF
  • DC Voting Rights Coalition – WordPDF

Media Advocacy Manual, from the American Public Health Association (APHA)
Connecting with the Media

Community Organizing Activity Run by Sherri Coles and Suzanne Ripley

Community Organizing ReadingAdapted from “Strategies for Community Organizing” by John R. Johnson, San Diego State UniversityWordPDFCommunity Organizing ActivityWordPDF

Videos

Jennifer Matson, of DC Vote, showed the following videos at Saturday’s session.

Demand the Vote – Music Video & Song
http://www.dcvote.org/library/videodemandthevote.cfm
The song and video is by local musicians, Joe L. Da Vessel in collaboration with band Melodic, created a new song and commissioned by DC Vote . Demand the Vote is a great go-go song that entertains and educates people about DC voting rights.

“It’s Time” – Educational Video
http://www.dcvote.org/library/videoitstime.cfm
Shortly after DC Vote’s founding, “It’s Time” was created as a means to distill the issue of DC’s denial of democracy into an easily consumed and relatively short educational video. Since 2000, “It’s Time” has served to educate thousands of school students, civic association members and DC Vote supporters. While a few of the facts spoken in the video have changed, this is still one of the best and most powerful educational pieces used by DC Vote to spread the word of DC’s injustice.

Homework

Session 8 Homework
WordPDFMakeup Homework
WordPDF
This document is for people who have not completed all their homework assignments.  Homework is one of the requirements of this course.   If you have any questions about this, please see Margie or Jason right away. The makeup assignment is to be done in addition to your August homework and long term project presentation. For this assignment you will prepare a 3 minute talk about what you have learned through the DC Advocacy Partners program and how it will influence your role as an advocate in DC in the coming months and years. Included in this document are a list of questions that you can answer; the answers will become the basis for your 3 minute talk.

Long Term Project Presentation Planning

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Your Long Term Project is due no later than Friday, September 14, 2012 and you will be presenting this project at the graduation ceremony on September 15, 2012. There is a 5 minute time limit for your presentation. This is a form to help you plan what to hand in for your final project and also to help you plan your presentation. If you already have developed a plan for your presentation you also may want to review these points to see if you are covering these areas. You can write on this document and use additional paper if needed.