Northeast Kingdom Organizing is hosting a community organizing training for the Northeast Kingdom on February 8 at the St. Theresa’s Parish Hall in Orleans. The training is free of charge and snacks will be provided. Preregistration is REQUIRED by February 3. There will be an afternoon and evening session - please register by e-mailing martha@hardwickagriculture.org to get specific times! Six organizations are joining forces to put on a training session for people who want to make positive changes in the Northeast Kingdom through community organizing. You will learn about:
• What is community organizing? How is it different from direct service and advocacy?
• An example of a public action event
• Specific methods to get people together to make a difference for themselves
• Practice one-on-one meetings
• Initial identification of most urgent issues in the NEK
• Goals and timeline for Northeast Kingdom Organizing

This is about building community, developing our leadership skills and working together and with others for a better community and a fairer economy. The training session will be with lead organizers who have decades of experience: Ken Galdston of InterValley Project and Wendy Krom of Berkshire Interfaith Organizing based in the Berkshires of Massachusetts.

The Center for an Agricultural Economy in Hardwick is working with members of the Caledonia Grange, St. John’s Episcopal Church in Hardwick, the Most Holy Trinity Catholic Parish of Barton, Orleans, and Irasburg, the InterValley Project and Berkshire Interfaith Organizing based in Massachusetts to put on this training.

InterValley Project is a cooperative organizing network based in Newton, Massachusetts. It is an organizing network of seven regional organizations in New England, rooted in congregations and labor, housing, community and small business organizations, organizing for social and economic justice for their communities.

Kenneth Galdston - IVP Director/Organizer - In addition to helping organize and serving as the lead organizer of the Naugatuck and Merrimack Valley Projects, during the past 45 years Galdston has organized with African-American and white rural poor people in North Carolina, in blue collar and middle class neighborhoods in Chicago, Minneapolis-St. Paul, and Buffalo, and with a labor-based plant closing coalition in Eastern Massachusetts. He trained and worked with the Industrial Areas Foundation for seven years. Just prior to working with the Naugatuck Valley Project he graduated with a master’s degree in management from the Yale School of Organization and Management.

For more information on IVP, see www.intervalleyproject.org
For more information on CAE, see www.hardwickagriculture.org
For more information about the training session or to register, email CAE Community Organizer Martha Braithwaite at martha@hardwickagriculture.org or call the CAE office at 802-472-5362 ext. 204

Sign up soon as we expect the remaining spots to fill up quickly!