Organizational Learning
Listed below are some of the trainings that we provide as part of The UPRISE Collective, supporting our organization's mission by engaging in in-systems change work. These are trainings that we have given before. This list is fluid, and will change as the needs of the community change. Length and format of each training are also fluid, as we strive to consistently remain responsive to your community or organizational needs. Each training or package we develop is customized in collaboration with the community we are invited into.
Organizational Equity
Participants will engage in focused conversations in which they will learn to articulate the identities they hold, as well as how those identities intersect. Facilitators will share some information regarding Oregon’s history of inequity and exclusionary laws, making connections within the context of the organization's mission. Participants will be introduced to basic concepts in order to ground equity work, including the Cycle of Socialization, Five Faces of Oppression, Implicit Bias, and Cultural Humility. Facilitators will provide information on existing equity work within the community, and participants will have an opportunity to look critically at their own work at micro, mezzo, and macro levels and to begin to assess organizational needs. Stakeholders will also discuss where decision-making powers lie within the organization, and develop strategies for creating lasting change. Facilitators will provide information regarding the role of -ism’s and generational trauma in development, and strategies for creating more trauma-informed, culturally humble organizations and communities.
Educational Equity
Topics described in the paragraph above will be presented in the context of education. Participants will engage in facilitated conversations regarding disparities in educational outcomes and our role as educators to help students to feel represented, heard, and valued. Facilitators will trouble the foundations of the education system in the US, and work with participants to envision and develop strategies for decolonizing curricula, classroom spaces, and decision-making processes in a way that values multiple ways of "being" and "knowing."
Social Stories
Facilitators will provide education and coaching in the area of incorporating social stories into our work with children, thereby reinforcing the connection between social and emotional learning and equity.
Interrupting the Norms of Professionalism
In this training, participants will grapple with workplace culture, with special focus on the concept of being "professional," i.e. behaving in a "professional" manner. Discussions will be grounded in how organizational norms may be discounting the needs and cultural experiences of staff, as well as the needs of community members -- how can we encourage clients to show up as their whole selves when we ourselves may not do so? This training explores safe, culturally humble ways to maintain high standards for job performance, while allowing our team members to be who they are.
Cross-Cultural Conflict Resolution
Communicating cross-culturally in a way that upholds the personhood of each stakeholder is a skill. Facilitators will work with participants to begin to develop those skills, which are grounded in humility and an awareness of our own "lenses," i.e. the way we see the world based on our experiences and the multiple, intersecting identities we hold. Participants will come away from this training with concrete skills in the areas of active listening, culturally humble practice, and peaceful and effective conflict resolution.
Culturally Humble Mental Health Practice
Mental health practice in the United States can be (and often is) rooted in privileged norms, with ways of "being" and "knowing" that may sometimes contribute to the erasure of other cultural norms and experiences. Many methods and frameworks that are utilized in targeted communities were developed and tested in white, middle-class, Judeo-Christian, heteronormative, temporarily able bodied communities. This training is designed to critically assess those methods, and to provide education and coaching in culturally humble mental health practices that have arisen from within targeted communities.
Exploring Disability Justice
This workshop provides 101 level content for participants to explore Disability Justice. What does it mean? How do we differentiate it from the Disability Rights Movement? Attendees will learn to articulate the principles of Disability Justice, learn some of the key “dos” and “don’ts” of DJ in the workplace, and explore resources that support further learning.
Nonviolence in Social Services
Participants will be provided with education on the history of social services in targeted communities, with a focus on the emotional, psychological, and moral violence that can be introduced into helping relationships via invasive research, case management, and mental health treatment practices. Facilitators will provide resources for engaging in helping relationships non-violently and in a way that is person and community-centered and strengths-based.
History of Youth Movements
Participants will learn the unique history of youth who have built critical mass to achieve sweeping social change. Special emphasis will be placed on learning strategies to build critical mass in spaces where youth have less positional power.
Leveraging Our Power
This experience centers on learning skills to leverage the abilities and knowledge that exist within communities to support social change. Participants will practice Resource Mapping, Power Mapping, and other important organizing skills.
Decolonizing Self Care
This workshop is designed in two ways: one for BIPOC Communities and one for White Community.
The purpose of this workshop will be to trouble the idea of “self-care” within organizations and institutions. Presenters will discuss the origins of this idea and its grounding in capitalist, white supremacist norms. Instead of perpetuating the idea of “care” as a solely personal responsibility, we will discuss the concept of community care. Participants will learn strategies to practice community care, and discuss how organizations can bear the responsibility of creating work environments that uphold both individual and community wellness. In addition, the workshop will focus on the relationship between practicing meaningful community care and identifying features of institutional oppression that seek to prioritize some community members’ well-being over others. Presenters will guide participants through the experience using constructivist, popular education models in a highly participatory workshop.
Reimagine & Reclaim: Remembering who we are while walking in two worlds
This workshop is designed for BIPOC Social Service Providers.
As professionals of color caring for our communities we are often pulled in many directions and called to move through two (or more) very different worlds. Indigenizing our practice calls us to remember who we are and where we came from, reimagine how our change work can happen, and reclaim the power that comes from our collective histories and healing. This activity based workshop is designed to explore the systems we operate in, and challenges us to remember, reclaim, and honor the stories that guide the change work we are engaged in. We will name what colonization has tried to take from us, recenter around collaborative practices, and engage in healing by remembering our stories. Activities will center on collective history and changemaking, storytelling, and reclaiming our power.
Storytelling is Healing: Indigenizing Early Childhood Mental Health with Cuentoterapia.
This workshop is designed to center BIPOC caregivers, providers, parents, and early childhood professionals.
Storytelling lives in our very being as people of color, as parents and caregivers, and as early childhood educators. Since time immemorial we have used storytelling, relationships, and art to share important parts of ourselves, our memories, and our healing. This interactive workshop is designed for folks that care for tiny humxns who want to help connect the dots between play, story, relationships, development, and mental health. Participants will learn to utilize children’s stories to support learning, development, and healing, using concepts from CuentoTerapia, a mental health modality originally developed in Puerto Rico. The workshop will blend meaning making strategies with art projects that community members are free to continue to use with the children that enrich their lives. This workshop is designed for anyone who cares about kids - no special training required.
Unsnarling the Medical Model
The purpose of this workshop is the gain a better understanding of how the principles of equity and liberation can apply in the western medical model. We'll discuss the language of equity and liberation in a workshop style that honors the knowledge and lived experiences of those present while building our shared understanding of how this shows up in practice. Guided by historical harm and community resilience, this workshop digs deep and offers individual and small group reflective opportunities. We will engage in unpacking institutional harm and our personal power to shift present day structures that perpetuate that harm. This workshop is designed for those currently working in the medical, public health, or mental health settings.
Staff Retreats, Facilitation, and Coaching
We can work with you and/or your team to facilitate Staff Retreats, meetings, hard conversations, or healing spaces. We also engage in 1:1 coaching with organizational leaders.
Strategic Planning and Organizational Support
We work using community based participatory research and backward design to support organizations in developing a data-driven, community led plan. Our methods of data collection, analysis, and side-by-side work with a strategic planning team or partner at the organization creates a plan that supports the organization as a whole, and is grounded in racial justice with equity as a milestone on the pathway to liberation. Strategic planning or organizational support can look all kinds of ways but usually takes place over the course of six months or more. We build custom trainings, templates, and timelines that support the work you're ready to engage in.
From Unhoused to Housed
This training is an interactive social story grounded in providing a deeper understanding of how systemic inequity contributes to the rise and maintenance of our unhoused population, as well as strategies for holding space and providing support for these community members in a way that upholds dignity, respect, and self-determination.
Climate Resilience and Environmental Justice
This is a training that highlights the roots and resilience of a 500 year old Environmental Justice movement. We will look into what Environmental Justice is and isn’t. We will also dive into how climate change is affecting/will affect your specific region, and how your organization can enact positive community change to help lessen the grasp of the expected shift in climate.