Apply for Technology and Democracy Fellowship by 4/15

As NCDD reflects on the ways in which technology can support face to face D&D in today’s Tech Tuesday, we wanted to share this fellowship opportunity which supports the technological work that enhances democratic governance. [By the way, you can still join the free Tech Tuesday here!] Harvard Kennedy School’s Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, an NCDD member, recently announced they are offering an unpaid, non-resident Technology and Democracy Fellowship; to create space for participants to build relationships, develop their work or research, and have a unique opportunity to dig into the bigger questions behind their practice. The fellowship deadline is April 15th, so apply now if you are interested! Learn more about the details of the fellowship in the post below or find the original here.


Technology and Democracy Fellowship

Applications are now open for 2018 Fellowships. Applications can be found here

The Technology and Democracy Fellowship is part of an Ash Center initiative to explore technology’s role in improving democratic governance—with a focus on connecting to practice and on helping Harvard Kennedy School students develop crucial technology skills.

Over the course of the fellowship, participants design, develop, or refine a substantive project that is salient to their field. This project could entail research, writing, and developing strategy relating to each fellow’s work, or could take the form of a new platform, service, app, or idea.

Technology and Democracy Fellows form a virtual community through which they share ideas and resources, pose questions, offer feedback, and help one another with solving challenges in their projects or other work. The Kennedy School serves as a unique space for these technologists to take a step back from the day-to-day minutia working in the world of practice to discuss, research, and write about the bigger questions their work addresses.

Fellows also help students, staff, faculty, and other members of the HKS community to develop their understanding of major concepts and to build skills related to technology and governance. This knowledge sharing is primarily delivered through a hands-on, skill-building workshop that each fellow designs and leads once during the year on a topic of interest to the fellow (see past workshops here).  Fellows can also develop personal relationships with faculty, staff, and fellows at HKS in the form of consultation and mentoring, event/speaking opportunities, and more.

The Technology and Democracy Fellowship is an unpaid, non-resident fellowship, so Fellows are not expected to reside or work locally. We invite Technology and Democracy Fellows to Cambridge at least twice during the course of the fellowship year (at the Ash Center’s expense) to give workshops, present their work, and meet with members of the HKS community.

Eligibility
The Fellowship welcomes mid-career practitioners with an interest in leveraging technology to improve democratic governance. Each cohort of fellows includes technologists with an interest or background in democratic politics and governance or public and civic leaders with technology expertise.

How to Apply
Applications are now open. Please apply here.  The deadline for completed applications to be submitted is April 15, 2018. For questions, please contact Teresa Acuña at Teresa_Acuna@hks.harvard.edu.

Current Technology and Democracy Fellows
The 2017-18 Technology and Democracy Fellows are below.

Fatima Alam, Researcher on Trust and Safety at Google

Tiffani Ashley Bell, Founder and Executive Director of The Human Utility

Jeff Maher, Software Engineer for CivicActions

Marina Martin, Public Interest Technology Fellow at the New America Foundation

Aaron Ogle, Director of Product for the OpenGov Foundation

Mjumbe Poe, Co-founder and CTO of FixList

You can find the original version of this article on the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation’s site at www.ash.harvard.edu/technology-and-democracy-fellowship.

Canadian School of Peacebuilding

The Canadian School of Peacebuilding (CSOP), an institute of Canadian Mennonite University, offers a selection of five-day courses each June. Courses can be taken for professional or personal development or for academic credit.

The CSOP is designed for anyone between the ages of 20 and 90 who is interested in peace work, including not-for-profit staff and interns, activists and peace educators, community leaders, religious leaders, teachers and professors, students (undergraduate or graduate), and government officials. All participants need to be fluent in English. The school is designed to be an environment characterized by educating for peace and justice, learning through thinking and doing, generous hospitality and radical dialogue, and the modeling of invitational community. The CSOP is for peacebuilders from all faiths, countries and identity groups.

Information about registration, costs, meals, and lodging is available on their website, as well as course descriptions, instructor bios, videos, pictures and stories from past years of CSOP, and peace resources. You can follow them on Twitter, and find them on Facebook and Instagram. Inquiries about the school, especially regarding registration can be sent to their main email address: csop@cmu.ca.

Resource Link: http://csop.cmu.ca/

This resource was submitted by Megan Klassen-Wiebe, Partnership and Public Engagement Coordinator of Canadian School of Peacebuilding via the Add-a-Resource form.

Winter Updates from AASCU’s American Democracy Project

For those working with civic engagement and higher ed, we wanted to share these recent updates from AASCU’s the American Democracy Project about several exciting opportunities! Coming up this Wednesday, February 28th from 1-2pm Eastern, is a free webinar on assessing civic competency and engagement, and how these efforts translate to student learning. Second, there are three different national ADP awards nominations that are now open and are due by March 30. Finally, check out the upcoming 2018 Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement Meeting (#CLDE18) on June 6-9, hosted by the American Democracy Project (ADP), The Democracy Commitment (TDC), and the NASPA Lead Initiative. You can read the announcement below or find the original on ADP’s site here.


ADP Winter 2018 Updates & Announcements

With our recent effort to significantly increase our ADP programming, you might be interested in some of the upcoming ADP activities, including opportunities to get national recognition for deserving folks on your campuses.  Please pass along to those who might be interested as well.  Thank you in advance for your support

Free Webinar Featuring Assessment of Civic Competency and Engagement
Wednesday, February 28 | 1 p.m. – 2 p.m. EST
Register now

Walking our Talk: Converting Civic-Focused Mission Statements to Student Learning
Many higher education institutions include complex civic concepts as part of their missions, but how do we know if we are translating these lofty goals into student learning? Assessment is often viewed as a secondary or even bureaucratic institutional practice but done well it supports learning improvement processes that prioritize student development, organize institutional efforts, and direct change. This session will discuss recent ETS research initiatives focused on national trends in the assessment of civic competency and engagement as well as an institutional perspective on assessing and addressing these skills in students.

Presenters: Ross Markle, Senior Assessment Strategist for Higher Education, ETS; and Kara Owens, Special Assistant to the President for Institutional Effectiveness and Assessment, Salisbury University (Md.)

Nominations for Three ADP National Civic Engagement Awards Due March 30, 2018

  • The William M. Plater Award for Leadership in Civic Engagement is given each year to an AASCU chief academic officer in recognition of his or her leadership in advancing the civic mission of the campus. Chief academic officers may be nominated by anyone. The president or chancellor must endorse the nomination. Nomination materials for the 2018 Plater Award must be submitted electronically by March 30, 2018. For information and cover sheet: http://www.aascu.org/programs/adp/awards/WilliamPlater/
  • The John Saltmarsh Award for Emerging Leaders in Civic Engagement is presented annually to an emerging leader (e.g., early career faculty/staff) in the civic engagement field from an AASCU institution. Emerging Leaders may be nominated by anyone. Nomination materials for the 2018 Saltmarsh Award must be submitted electronically by March 30, 2018. For information and cover sheet: http://www.aascu.org/programs/adp/awards/JohnSaltmarsh/
  • The Barbara Burch Award for Faculty Leadership in Civic Engagement is presented annually to a senior faculty member in the civic engagement field from an AASCU institution. Senior ADP faculty members may be nominated by anyone. The provost or chief academic officer must endorse the nomination. Nomination materials for the 2018 Burch Award must be submitted electronically by March 30, 2018. For information and cover sheet: http://www.aascu.org/programs/adp/awards/BarbaraBurch/

Participate in ADP’s National Conference: The 2018 Civic Learning & Democratic Engagement (CLDE) Meeting
Wednesday, June 6, 2018 to Saturday, June 9, 2018
Hyatt Regency Orange County • Anaheim, California

The American Democracy Project (ADP), The Democracy Commitment (TDC), and NASPA are committed to advancing the civic engagement movement in higher education. Join us in Anaheim, California for our annual conference which brings together faculty, student affairs professionals, senior campus administrators, students and community partners. Together we will ensure that students graduate from our colleges and universities–both public and private–prepared to be the informed, engaged citizens that our communities and our democracy need.

Learn more about ADP and how to be engaged during our ADP Organizing Meeting on Thursday, June 7 from 9 a.m. – Noon. Annual awards will be presented during this meeting.

For more information: http://www.aascu.org/meetings/clde18/
Register now for the best rates.

You can find the original version of this ADP blog post at: https://adpaascu.wordpress.com/2018/02/15/adp-winter-2018-updates-announcements/.

NCDD at Innovations in Participatory Democracy Conference

We are thrilled to let folks know that NCDD staff, Courtney Breese and I will be at the Innovations in Participatory Democracy Conference, which is happening on March 8th – 10th in the Phoenix area. This conference will be a fantastic opportunity to learn about the top innovations in civic engagement and democracy, and to network with leaders in the field doing this powerful work.

We are especially excited to announce we will be presenting a session in collaboration with two fellow NCDD members: Cassandra Hemphill of the IAP2 Federation and adjunct faculty at Missoula College of the University of Montana, as well as, Annie Rappeport of the University of Maryland where she serves as a PhD Student and Research Assistant. In this interactive workshop, we will use art to explore participants’ individual connections to participatory democracy, what led us to our work on improving our democracy, and what each of us offer to the field. We’ll explore how we are connected in our communities and how we might connect with others to strengthen participatory democracy. If you are attending IPD, we hope you will join us for our session during Block 1 on Thursday, March 8th from 3-4:30pm.

While we are in town, we would love to meet up with NCDDers in the area (and those attending the conference)! We are working to identify a location that could accommodate a meetup on Friday night (March 9th) after the IPD events that evening. If you are in town on the 9th and would like to join us, send Courtney an email at courtney[at]ncdd[dot]org and we’ll keep you in the loop as we firm up our plans!

IPD is being hosted by NCDD member organizations – the Participatory Budgeting Project and the Jefferson Center, as well as, the Center for the Future of Arizona, the Katal Center, the Participatory Governance Initiative at Arizona State University, Phoenix Union High School District, and the Policy Jury Group. If you’ve never been to a conference hosted by PBP and these fine organizations, you are in for a special treat! Tickets go up February 28th – so make sure you get yours ASAP.

There are several pre-conference trainings planned for Wednesday, March 7th, like a training on participatory budgeting (PB) hosted by the Participatory Budgeting Project, or a training on citizen juries, citizen assemblies, sortition, and more hosted by the Jefferson Center and the Policy Jury Group. Click here to learn more and register for these pre-conference trainings, and to see the full IPD conference schedule.

Remember to keep an eye out for Courtney and I if you are attending the conference because we would love to see you!

Kettering Releases New Higher Education Exchange

We want to encourage our members in higher education to check out the newest version of the Higher Education Exchange, a free annual publication from NCDD member organization the Kettering Foundation. The Exchange explores important and timely themes around the public mission of colleges and universities and offers reflections from both domestic and international scholar-practitioners on how higher education can and must shift toward teaching deliberation and civic engagement. We highly recommend it. You can learn more about the 2017 edition in the Kettering announcement below or find the full downloadable version here.


Higher Education Exchange 2017: Deliberation as Public Judgment

The 2017 issue of the Higher Education Exchange (HEX) takes on the divisive political moment we find ourselves in and argues that civic work that tries to be apolitical, or stays within the comfort zone of higher education, will not help us to bridge the divides that threaten our democracy

What makes this moment so critical? Polarization is now more intractable than it has ever been before. While elected officials have always had their disagreements, research has confirmed partisanship in Washington has grown to new levels. Media polarization is also on the rise. Not only are we confronted with ongoing socioeconomic and geographical divides, but also social media further enables segmentation into bubbles of like-minded groups. While information has never been more accessible, the citizenry cannot even agree on what constitutes factual information, much less how to interpret its implications.

In addition to the usual gridlock, the discourse of “winners” and “losers” raises the stakes of politics. Each side fears that the other seeks power to impose its will, further increasing the sense of tension and mistrust. As politics comes to be seen exclusively as a competition for power, the outcomes have less claim to be regarded as the expression of a deliberative process that represents the common good.

As a public institution, higher education would seem to be ideally placed to build bridges across these political divides. However, higher education has construed its neutrality narrowly, attempting to steer clear of politics rather than actively bridge political divides. At least since the advent of the modern research university, higher education has focused largely on the production and transmission of expert knowledge, conceiving its democratic role as informing the public. Higher education institutions are thus built around an epistemology that separates “facts” from “values” and, understandably, the historical focus has been on the former rather than the latter. However, if our current dysfunctions have more to do with political divisions than informational deficits, the question becomes: what more expansive civic role is higher education capable of playing?

In recent years, higher education has begun to talk more actively about its civic role. As part of this civic renewal, the word deliberation has enjoyed a resurgence, and higher education has played a key role in nurturing a field of practice across professional domains now ostensibly devoted to deliberative democracy. But what deliberation means may be more varied and obscure than ever. Depending on their purposes and contexts, practices referred to under the rubric of deliberation may have various and even contradictory effects. Deliberation is used for strikingly different purposes, including civic education, conflict resolution, input into government policy and administration, and social justice, and sponsoring organizations make a variety of design choices to suit their purposes. Despite such differences, deliberation is also used to describe the varied practices and examples taking place.

As a research foundation committed to a particular understanding of deliberation, Kettering’s challenge is to be clear about what we mean when we use the term. This volume of HEX attempts to distill Kettering’s understanding of deliberation.

At least two important themes define Kettering’s approach. First, this approach to deliberation is political. It aims to address dysfunctions of our political system, particularly the polarization of our public discourse and resulting loss of confidence in institutions.

Second, at the center of our approach to deliberation is the exercise of the human faculty of judgment. That is, rather than technical or instrumental problems, we seek to apply deliberation primarily to the complex value questions that most divide our country. Because such questions cannot be answered objectively, no amount of technical knowledge can resolve them. While judgment lacks the certainty of scientific knowledge as well as the romantic appeal of a unanimous consensus, we think it is precisely the virtue that is needed to address the communicative dysfunctions of our current political climate.

As our public discourse becomes increasingly adversarial, higher education and other expert professions may be tempted to double down on “informing” the public with expert knowledge. Kettering’s research suggests that we are in need of something different, an ethos—a set of skills, norms, and habits for civic discourse. While higher education is in a position to help bridge our differences, its overwhelming tendency has been to prioritize technical knowledge at the expense of civic ethos. Proponents of deliberation may unwittingly compound the problem by confusing the two. For those who wish to bridge our divides, we hope this collection will help them return their focus to the human faculty of judgment and recover the political roots of deliberation.

We hope this edition of HEX sparks a lively conversation on these themes.

You can find the original announcement of this on Kettering’s site at www.kettering.org/blogs/hex-2017-deliberation-public-judgment.

PBP Opening for PhDs as Participation Design Strategist

There is an exciting opportunity for recent PhDs to work with NCDD member org, Participatory Budgeting Project (PBP) and help strengthen participatory democracy! PBP recently announced they have an opening as a Participation Design Strategist, part of the Mellow/ACLS Public Fellows program, for those who are new PhDs. The deadline to apply is March 14th, 2018 for the position, and we hope some NCDDers will apply (by clicking here)! You can read more information on the fellowship opening in the post below or find the original here. Good luck to all applicants!


Mellon/ACLS Fellowship Opening – Participation Design Strategist

At the Participatory Budgeting Project, we’re pleased to announce that we have been selected by the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) as a host organization for the Mellon/ACLS Public Fellows Program, a career-building fellowship initiative designed to expand the reach of doctoral education in the humanities. In 2018, the Public Fellows program will place up to 25 recent PhDs from the humanities and humanistic social sciences in two-year staff positions at partnering organizations in government and the nonprofit sector. Fellows will participate in the substantive work of these organizations and will receive professional mentoring, an annual stipend of $67,500, and health insurance.

The application deadline is March 14, 2018 (9pm EDT). For more information, please visit http://www.acls.org/programs/publicfellowscomp/.

Fellowship Details
Position Title:
Participation Design Strategist

Position Description:
We are seeking a Participation Design Strategist to work in PBP’s Participation Lab, one of our three program areas. The Lab evaluates, researches, and develops tools and practices to make participatory budgeting and democracy work better. The strategist will work closely with other staff and partners to develop and test strategies that improve PBP’s services and PB processes. Through this work the strategist will identify and help implement design solutions that enable participatory democracy to grow and scale, and that advance equity, diversity, and inclusion in civic participation. This will include close collaboration with government and nonprofit staff, community leaders, and user design experts.

This position is great preparation for those interested in a career in the nonprofit or public sectors, including in user experience design, human centered design, public participation, civic engagement, program evaluation, service delivery, or public administration. This is a new position that expands PBP’s capacity to make data-informed design decisions as well as to keep pace with the increasing volume and diversity of communities excited about deepening local democracy. See the full job posting here.

  • Stipend: $67,500 per year, with health insurance coverage for the fellow, a relocation allowance, and up to $3,000 in professional development funds over the course of the fellowship
  • Tenure: Two years; start date on August 1 or September 1, 2018, depending on the fellowship position
  • Applications will be accepted only through the ACLS Online Fellowship Application system (ofa.acls.org). The system will open on January 4, 2018.
  • Application deadline: March 14, 2018, 9pm EDT
  • Notification of application status will occur by email starting late-May 2018.

Mellon/ACLS Public Fellows is a fellowship program offered by the American Council of Learned Societies and is made possible by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Please direct all inquiries about the fellowship program to ACLS.

You can find the original version of this announcement on the Participatory Budgeting Project’s site at www.participatorybudgeting.org/mellon-fellowship/

Submit Your #CLDE18 Program Proposals by Jan. 29th

For those of you passionate about advancing civic engagement in higher education, make sure you check out the 2018 Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement Meeting (CLDE18) coming up June 6, 2018 in Orange County, California. Coordinated by the American Democracy Project (ADP), The Democracy Commitment (TDC), and the NASPA Lead Initiative; it’s sure to be a great networking and learning opportunity. Program proposals are currently being accepted until January 29, 2018 – submit yours ASAP! You can read the announcement below or find the original on ADP’s site here.


#CLDE18: Lend your voice to something bigger than yourself

An unprecedented chapter of America’s political history is upon us and it has never been more critical to nurture engagement with democracy in our students. It is as engaged citizens that we can put the values we proclaim on our campuses into action, and support those with less access, privilege, resources, and even basic rights, who are seeking a path to higher education.

The 2018 Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement Meeting (CLDE18), being held June 6-9, 2018 at the Hyatt Regency Orange County, in Anaheim, California, offers an opportunity for student affairs professionals, faculty, community partners, and students, to participate in discourse around the fundamentals of democracy and gain inspiration from our featured speakers to take back to your campus community. #CLDE18 will rejuvenate your passion for activating your students to be the change they want to see in the world.

The American Democracy Project (ADP), The Democracy Commitment (TDC), and the NASPA Lead Initiative are committed to advancing the civic engagement movement in higher education, and invite you to submit a program proposal to this unique and vital professional development event by Monday, January 29, 2018.

We urge you to be a part of something bigger than yourself by sharing your civic learning or democratic engagement theory, success, or best practice—or by joining us as a participant for this year’s convening of change.

Register by May 1, 2018 to get the best rates.

You can read the original version of this at ADP’s site at www.adpaascu.wordpress.com/2018/01/10/clde18-lend-your-voice-to-something-bigger-than-yourself/.

Highlights from the December 2017 Kettering Newsletter

The holidays are in full swing and we wanted to boost the newsletter updates released this week from NCDD org member, the Kettering Foundation. They recently published two of their annual periodicals – Connections 2017 and Higher Education Exchange 2017, which we encourage you to check out. Over the last two years, Kettering has been working together with libraries, museums, and historical associations, on how these bodies can enrich their work by deeper engagement with their communities. Finally, we’d like to congratulate Sherry Magill on becoming Kettering’s newest addition to their board. There’s more to the newsletter that we didn’t share so make sure you sign up for their monthly updates by clicking here to stay up-to-date on all that Kettering is working on.


Kettering Foundation News & Notes – December 2017

We mark the end of 2017 with the publication of two of our annual periodicals–take a look and learn more about ongoing research. We wish everyone warm holidays, a rejuvenating break, and a happy and productive New Year.

Connections 2017: Letter from the Editors

The 2017 issue of Connections, edited by KF director of strategic initiatives Melinda Gilmore and KF program officer Randall Nielsen, focuses on key opportunities in democratic citizenship today. There are signs of renewed civic vitality in our communities, and this year’s issue of Connections highlights such stories. A note on Connections 2017 is now available on the Kettering blog. Read it here.

Exchanging Research with Libraries and Museums

Libraries and museums are, unsurprisingly, some of Kettering’s best partners in learning. Over the past two years, program officer Joni Doherty has led a number of related research exchanges bringing together museums, historical associations, and libraries to explore how they can enrich their work by building in fuller, more sophisticated ideas about citizenship and democratic practice. In 2017, several experiments within these exchanges culminated in exciting new initiatives.

Higher Education Exchange 2017

This year’s Higher Education Exchange takes on the divisive political moment we find ourselves in and argues that civic work that tries to be apolitical, or that stays within the comfort zone of higher education, will not help us bridge the divides that threaten our democracy. This year’s volume includes contributions from Jane Mansbridge, Ronald Beiner, Dan Yankelovich, Noëlle McAfee, David McIvor, Lori Britt, Maura Casey, Harry Boyte, and, of course, both Kettering president David Mathews and HEX editor and program officer Derek Barker. Download a copy.

Sherry Magill Elected to Kettering Board

Sherry Magill, a national leader in philanthropy and higher education, has been elected a member of the board of directors of the Kettering Foundation. Magill serves as president of the Jessie Ball duPont Fund, a private grantmaking foundation located in Jacksonville, Florida.

“Sherry Magill’s distinguished career in philanthropy and higher education connects with the foundation’s research into the link between the work of citizens and these important institutions,” said Kettering president David Mathews. “Her experience, expertise, and deep understanding of the role of higher education and philanthropy will be an invaluable resource that will inform many areas of the foundation’s work.”

Prior to joining the fund’s staff in 1991 as a program officer for education, Magill served as vice president and deputy to the president of Washington College, where she taught courses in American studies and on the American South.

She holds a BA and an MA from the University of Alabama and a doctorate in American studies from Syracuse University. She has served as a senior moderator for the Aspen Institute and is the founding executive director of the Wye Faculty Seminar, a nationally recognized enrichment program for professors teaching in the nation’s small colleges.

Magill has served as chair of the Council on Foundations board, State of Florida Supreme Court Judicial Nominating Commission, and the P.A.C.E. Center for Women board and is past president of the Jacksonville Women’s Network board. She is a founding member and past chair of the Florida Philanthropic Network and is a member of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation-Jacksonville (LISC) advisory committee.

As always, if you have news you would like to share, please get in touch. We’re especially interested in stories of how you apply ideas and insights shared with you at Kettering.

Davenport Offers Local Gov’t Public Engagement Certificate

We are excited to share, NCDD member org the Davenport Institute, in partnership with the Pepperdine School of Public Policy, recently launched a professional Certificate in Advanced Public Engagement for Local Government [non-academic] and are offering the workshop this Jan 19-21, 2018. NCDD members receive a 20% discount on the training, so make sure you register by Jan 7th at the latest to receive this great benefit. Excellent for anyone involved or working with local government, or in graduate school for local government/public policy. They are accepting applications until the class is full, so sign up while you still can! You can read the announcement below or on the Pepperdine School of Public Policy’s website here.


Davenport Institute for Public Engagement and Civic Leadership: Professional Certificate in Advance Public Engagement for Local Government

Are you a local government practitioner in search of a New Year’s Resolution? Do you know someone who is?  Why not make 2018 the year to become a champion of resident engagement?

Join us in Malibu, California on January 19-21 for a three-day intensive workshop.

In an age where trust in government (and indeed in all institutions) is at an all-time low, and indifference toward local government is at an all-time high, the very future of local representative democracy requires leaders with a new skill – an ability to break through cynicism and mistrust and engage residents in local policy.

From public safety, to city budgets and spending, to planning and environmental policies, today’s challenges need leaders who can re-vitalize public involvement and lead residents engaged in the difficult work of self-government.

This program is designed for local government and private-sector practitioners serving local governments as well as for graduate students focused on local government. Concepts covered include:

  • Getting engagement right from the start
  • Leading edge techniques for creative public engagement
  • Engaging marginalized communities
  • The role of technology in public engagement
  • Facilitating difficult conversations
  • Leading public engagement from where you are.

For more information and to apply visit: http://publicpolicy.pepperdine.edu/certificate-public-engagement.

Applicants who are accepted to the program can receive a 20% discount when they use the code “NCDD” during registration.

You can read the announcement on the Pepperdine School of Public Policy’s website at www.publicpolicy.pepperdine.edu/certificate-public-engagement.

Exciting Updates from the Center for Public Deliberation

We want to lift up the work going on in our network and the incredible value it brings to improving dialogue and deliberation, public engagement and democracy. To show the value of both the work going on in our field and why we encourage you to support NCDD during our End-of-Year fund drive.

As part of the Fund Drive, we will be sharing the highlights from around the field every week and why we believe in this network’s vital work. That’s why we want to share these exciting updates from our NCDD Board Chair, Martín Carcasson, co-founder and director of the Center for Public Deliberation (CPD) at Colorado State University, and the talented CPD alumni.

Martín gave a “CivicEdTalk” keynote at the 2017 Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement (#CLDE17) meeting that took place in Baltimore, Maryland from June 7-10, 2017. The talk, which you can find here, is a condensed version of his NCDD bootcamp talk that some of you may be familiar with, tailored to the higher ed audience. He talks about how we engage communities to work to address the “wicked problems,” that he describes as “not bad people with wicked values, but the wickedness is in the problem and not the people.” By framing it this way, the situation shifts people from a less adversarial place to a more collaborative one. We recommend you check out his Facebook page called “the Wicked Problems Mindset,” for more information.

Martín has an upcoming online webinar with IAP2 called “Beginning with the Brain in Mind” on how to build public processes by taking human nature into consideration. Learn how to avoid the negative human tendencies like confirmation bias and selection exposure, and instead tap our positive aspects like creativity and empathy. The webinar is on December 12th at 11am Pacific/2pm Eastern and you can register for it by clicking here.

We also wanted to share some of the fantastic work his CPD colleagues and alumni have produced…

  • Kalie McMonagle, the new CPD Program Manager, released the report called, “Partnering for Inclusion: Recruitment strategies for deliberative conversations”, which focuses on how cross-sector partners gathered participants to engage in deliberative conversations.
  • Samantha Maldonado released the report, “Inclusion Around the Cycle: Applying strategies of sufficient inclusion throughout the cycle of deliberative inquiry”on being more inclusive before/during/after deliberative events.
  • Leah Sprain, former CPD Associate Director, released the report, “Citizens Speaking as Experts: Expertise discourse in deliberative forums”.

You can keep up with the CPD’s work at their website or on Facebook.

Keep an eye on the blog and NCDD’s social media this month (and always) for more great updates from the dialogue & deliberation field. Don’t forget to help NCDD and our network continue the important work of sharing the stories of the power of D&D, collaborating, and connecting to improve our work, by contributing to the NCDD End-of-Year Fund Drive!