Community Leaders Program
Community Leadership Institute
What
is Leadership?
When you picture a leader, what comes to mind? A powerful public speaker? A
director? A visionary? Someone who stands in front, or someone who organizes
behind the scenes? Is it about charisma or skills? Can you learn to be a leader?
In The Literacy Project’s Community Leaders Program, we’ve thought a lot about these questions. We believe that everyone has the capacity for effective leadership and that we can all learn to be strong leaders. We train students in “community leadership,” a model of leading that focuses on helping groups work together to make change in their communities. We believe that leadership is about learning to use our power effectively; community leadership encourages us to use our power with others, rather than over others. In this model of democratic leadership, leaders focus on communication, group dynamics, creative conflict resolution, critical thinking and skills of working collaboratively.
In addition to developing these “building block” skills of community leadership, we work hard to demystify the things leaders do. We break down into discreet steps the things we do when we run meetings, give a speech, organize a training or plan an event. Then we give participants the opportunity to practice these skills in a safe and supportive environment. What had seemed like a complex art becomes something participants feel they can really do.
Learning leadership is a lifelong practice. It requires that we being willing to take risks, make mistakes, reflect on what we’ve learned and continue to grow. At some point, we each have to answer the questions for ourselves: “What kind of leader do I want to be? How will I use my power?”
The Literacy Project’s
Community Leadership Institute
Spring 2003 Institute members
The Literacy Project’s Community Leadership Institute is a 12-week training
program that provides leadership training and community service experiences
to learners and other community members interested in getting involved in their
community. The program relies on experiential learning techniques- using games,
activities and authentic opportunities to practice skills within a supportive
group setting, and through a community service project the participants choose
for themselves. Participants learn and practice skills used to effectively work
with a group, from dealing with conflict to facilitating meetings or running
an activity. Through small group community service projects, participants get
to apply their learning in new ways- and carry out a project from the planning
stage to the evaluation stage. Past group projects include a workshop on STD’s
and safer sex, promoting volunteerism in the community, working with a teen
program and organizing a student alumni speakers bureau.
TLP’s Community Leadership Institute Training Materials are organized into 7 different topics and are designed to be used as a series of handouts for participants with limited literacy skills.
Topics include:
o Defining Leadership
o Communication
o Group Development
o Service Learning Projects
o Facilitator’s Tips
o Toolbox
Margaret Anderson, one of the project developers, is available to help you design
your own training program for your class or group, or to provide a workshop
on a number of topics related to leadership training. Please email: margaret@literacyproject.org
or call 413-774-3934, ex 15.
Thanks go to Lynne
Paju who was the other project developer.