West Virginia Training for Trainers

Training and facilitation skills are key to the success of community engagement and organizing. People who have these skills support the groups they work with by developing new leaders, transferring knowledge between generations, creating more participation within their groups, educating and engaging constituents, supporting meetings and decision making, resolving conflict and providing skills for successful, creative and disciplined actions.

Yet, few people who play the role of educator, trainer or facilitator in their work are offered an opportunity to learn a framework for training that supports their experience or a chance to hone their skills among other trainers in their context.

With this in mind, a team of West Virginia organizers has created The West Virginia Trainers Project to grow these important skills at home in West Virginia. And this summer is your chance to plug in!

Participants in this summer workshop will

Gain greater awareness about themselves and their strengths as a facilitators;
Get a chance to take risks, experiment and refine skills in a safe and supportive environment;
Get the stimulation of fresh approaches and increased options;
Receive personal guidance from experienced trainers in a small group setting;
Learn new tools that are easily adapted, principles of workshop design, skills for working with diversity and a better understanding of how to use experiential education methods effectively.

Who should apply?

This workshop is open to all West Virginia organizers. We especially encourage low-income organizers, organizers of color, organizers in their teens and 20s and gender non-conforming organizers to apply.

We also encourage participants to apply with someone they work or volunteer with. We have found that when participants attend in teams, they’re able to better apply the skills and frameworks they learn when they return home.

Finally, this workshop is full of chances to practice group process design and facilitation concepts for your home context. Organizers who are actively working with a group will get more out of the event.

Workshop format

The workshop begins with dinner and registration at 6PM on Thursday and runs until 6PM Saturday. The workshop hours for each day are as follows:

Thursday–start 6PM, end between 9PM and 10PM, dinner provided
Friday–start 9AM, end between 9PM and 10PM, breakfast, lunch and dinner provided
Saturday–start 9AM, end by 6PM, breakfast and lunch provided

Though the hours of this workshop are long, we’ve found that the experiential style helps keep people engaged, alert and energized through our time together. We also provide time for short and extended breaks within the agenda and encourage participants to take care of themselves so that they can stay fully present.

The workshop is designed as an experiential package with each session building on the previous session. We want to create the best learning environment possible for participants to absorb the combined learning of each session and therefore WE DO NOT ALLOW PARTIAL ATTENDANCE; you must commit to taking the entire workshop.

Throughout the workshop there are multiple opportunities for discussion about specific questions or challenges that you may want to explore. This is a fun but rigorous workshop and as participants stretch themselves to become better trainers, strong emotions can surface. We do our best to support you to take care of yourself in this workshop and get the most learning out of challenging moments.

How much does it cost?

This 2.5 day workshop has a sliding scale fee of $100-$400 based on income and ability to pay. This fee covers lodging, six workshop meals, and materials. Full scholarships are available on a needs-basis.

Things to know before you apply

Due to the level of interest in this training opportunity, we will not be able to accept more than 3 participants per organization in this session. We will ask groups with more than 3 applicants to help us choose their ideal team. Future trainings will be available.
This training will be most useful to participants who are currently training and facilitating with a group or with multiple groups.

Graduates from this workshop are eligible to participate in other components of The West Virginia Trainers Project. These components include:

A year-long coaching program in which participants get individualized support to apply new skills and frameworks to their day-to-day organizing work
Access to a 2.0 Training for Trainers in West Virginia to continue growing as a facilitator in a community of peers
Access to bi-annual Design Labs in which participants get the chance to learn new approaches for a specific facilitation challenge such as, How to Facilitate Group Conflict