The Community Organizing for Climate Justice course equips leaders with a climate justice framework and practical tools to implement team-based climate resiliency projects or other climate justice projects in their communities. Faith-based community organizing for climate justice provides participants with skills, knowledge, spiritual grounding, and a community of support for organizing to address the climate crisis in ways that build racial and economic equity. A sequence of workshops, small group coaching and community practice will allow program participants to understand themselves as leaders, expand their capacity to enroll others in collective action, and understand the roles of teams in creating change.

The skills training sessions total 20 hours, the small group/peer coaching-mentors sessions total 14 hours. Participants spend 2-4 hours a week outside of the scheduled sessions to develop and implement their climate justice or climate resiliency project.

• People of faith interested in climate justice who are interested in putting their values into action 
• Professionals currently working in the field of climate justice who would like to expand their tools and skillset via a praxis project 
• Early career organizers who would benefit from structured coaching or exposure to theological underpinnings for climate justice work

$300 covers training sessions and coaching sessions.

Tuition assistance available for eligible participants.

o At the start of the program, each participant provides a set of available days/times for their small group coaching/mentoring sessions. This provides the information necessary to form the small group cohorts.
o There are typically 3-7 people in a small group cohort.
o The coaching sessions focus on developing each person’s climate justice/climate resilience project.
o The 12 coaching sessions are guided by an organizer-mentor.
o The group works collaboratively. Members provide each other with support and feedback as they plan and implement their climate projects.

Maureen integrates academic rigor with practical, community-led practices in her work.  She has 20 years experience in leadership, program development, research, design and evaluation, grant writing and management, budget management, and direct practice. This includes nine years of social work teaching, fourteen years of social work practice and six years in consulting. She currently teaches at the University of Michigan, where she earned an MSW

Meghan is a Co-Founder and  Director of Grace in Action Collectives in Southwest Detroit. Meghan spent five years as a Community Organizer with the PICO (Faith in Action Network), and five years working as a Co-Organizer for the Organizing for Mission Cohort (Network) through the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). Through this work Meghan guided congregational leaders to utilize their land, financial, and community resources to create social justice projects in their communities. Meghan has an MDiv. from PLTS (CLU), an MSW from Eastern Michigan University, and is an ordained Deacon in the ELCA.

Bianca is the Program Director at Beloved Community Incubator in Washington, DC. Neighborhood listening sessions led to her engagement with small micro-business projects with local residents, which led to the founding of BCI. Bianca is trained in community organizing by the Industrial Areas Foundation, Faith in Action Network, and Gamaliel Network. She works in Washington, DC, where she has shaped the creation of mutual aid disaster response networks and led worker campaigns for almost a decade.