In early October, over 40 organizers, member leaders, and staff from 18 partner organizations participated in an intensive two-day New Organizers Training program, held at CPD’s Brooklyn office.

The training focused on building basic organizing skills and included topics such as: membership recruitment, building relationships through one-to-ones, leadership development, understanding power, campaign strategy, and creative direct action. During the program, participants went out to knock on doors in Bushwick with Make the Road New York to talk to residents about building power and about protecting New Yorkers living in rent controlled apartments.

During the program, we were delighted to be joined by Andrew Boyd from Beautiful Trouble, who worked with participants on the art of building creative direct action. Participants left ready to focus on developing leadership and creating strategic capacity within their member base through their campaigns and programmatic work.

One participant reflected on what they will bring back to their work, writing, “I am going to focus on building deep, strong relationships with members based on a common political bond; I am going to be more intentional about creating roles for members that move them towards leadership; and I am going to work with members to implement "norms" for our decision making processes.”