Find Your VOICES
Education Resources
Training seminars and webinars will be available in the coming months. These training sessions are designed to give you the tools you need to become well-equiped and well-informed advocates. Here are several training sessions that we will offer to members of Our VOICES network:
Mastering Town Hall Meetings: Great advocacy often builds on a solid connection between elected officials and a group of constituents. In this session, learn how to forge such a connection at a town hall meeting, where legislators typically share their accomplishments and aspirations, and gather input from the people they serve.
Public Speaking, Module by Module: Our approach to this most fundamental -and, for many people, most daunting-form of advocacy communication hinges on breaking a speech down into blocks, or modules lasting three to five minutes each. We will review what goes into a module, how to arrange the components, and how to construct transitions. Plus, how to handle the jitters.
Making Use of Social Media: “Social media” are online platforms that make it easy for anyone to respond in kind to what was once mostly one-way communications. From Wikipedia to Facebook, nytimes.com, and on into the blogosphere, the advent of social media brings with it an array of advocacy opportunities which will be described and illustrated in this Webinar.
The Web Video Appeal…and the Appeal of Web Videos: Public speaking in miniature, television on the cheap, with the pressure off yet the potential for influence very much on. This Webinar will show you how it is not to late to be a pioneer in video advocacy communications. Techniques of scripting, staging, filming, captioning, tagging, and distributing.
Barbecues and Tailgates - When Social Gatherings Get Political: For those occasions when your answer to the question “What do you do for a living” is greeted with an invitation to an argument. We talk about the importance of demonstrating empathy and techniques for occupying the moral high ground without seeming righteous or insincere.
Communicating with Young Adults: Youth participation in civic and political life has been on the rise for several years, and advocates need to tap the enthusiasm, brains, and energy of The Millennial Generation, the largest cohort group in American history. This Webinar is devoted to the idiosyncrasies of communicating about public affairs with this key demographic.
Pitching In During a Crisis: Grassroots voices can be invaluable during those high-velocity message periods when a big policy decision approaches or the reputation of the industry swings into the spotlight. Learn how best you can help in this Webinar.
Prevailing in a Panel or Debate: In panels, debates, and sometimes informal situations, you will vie against advocates for the other side. We’ll teach you how to scope out leverage points in these situations, good ways to prepare (if you have the time), and review tactics and counter-tactics for gaining advantage with the audience.
Convening and Leading Small Group Meetings: We conclude the year with advice on the advocate’s best source of renewable energy: a face-to-face session among people who share a viewpoint and can be molded into a team. You’ll learn the steps to harness this energy, from the invitations to the marching orders.