Another roundup of webinars coming your way! We are thrilled to share the following list of webinars happening this week from the NCDD network, including NCDD members National Civic League and Living Room Conversations, and Cities of Service. We know there is a lot of great work going on in the field, and like we mentioned last week, we will be doing more roundup-style posts of webinars going on in order to keep up with all the great D&D happenings.
NCDD works to strengthen our network by being a resource center and hub for those passionate and working under the wide umbrella of dialogue, deliberation, and engagement work. We strive to support our coalition with posts such as this that elevate our members work and help to keep folks in our field informed on what’s going on.
We have a lot of vision for how NCDD can be of better service for our members, the D&D field, and our society. If you appreciate the work NCDD does and would like to support us (and invest in this vital field!), then please make a tax-deductible donation to NCDD today during our End-of-the-Year Fundraiser!
Do you have a webinar coming up that you’d like to share with the NCDD network? Please let us know by emailing me at keiva[at]ncdd[dot]org, because we’d love to add it to the list!
Cities of Service webinar – “How Tulsa’s Residents Increased the City’s Capacity to Address Public Problems”
Wednesday, December 12th
11am-12pm Pacific, 2-3pm Eastern
This spring, Cities of Service named the City of Tulsa, Oklahoma one of three winners of our Engaged Cities Award. Among several successful strategies to engage citizens, the city established the Urban Data Pioneers program made up of citizens committed to helping solve public problems by analyzing specific data.
This webinar will focus on a new city program called Civic Innovation Fellowship. This program takes citizen engagement in public problem solving even deeper. The program relies on citizens to shape the public problem, collect data around it, prototype solutions, and present the best ones to the city for budget considerations. James Wagner, City of Tulsa’s Chief of Performance Strategy and Innovation will talk through the process of the Civic Innovation Fellowship highlighting lessons and impact to date.
REGISTER: https://register.gotowebinar.com/register/3077404798140506637
Living Room Conversations webinar – “Media and Polarization”
Thursday, December 13th
3:30-5 pm Pacific, 6:30-8pm Eastern
Join us for a free online (using Zoom) Living Room Conversation on the topic of Media and Polarization. Please see the conversation guide for this topic. Some of the questions explored include:
You will need a device with a webcam to participate (preferably a computer or tablet rather than a cell phone).
Please only sign up for a place in this conversation if you are 100% certain that you can join – and thank you – we have many folks waiting to have Living Room Conversations and hope to have 100% attendance. If you need to cancel please return to Eventbrite to cancel your ticket so someone on the waitlist may attend.
A link to join the conversation and additional details will be sent to you by no later than the day before the conversation. The conversation host is Lewis G.
REGISTER: www.livingroomconversations.org/event/living-room-conversation-media-and-polarization/
National Civic League Webinar – “Engaging the Public in Fiscal Matters”
Wednesday, December 19th
11:30 am Pacific, 2:30 pm Eastern
Can the public really help local governments make solid budget decisions? Of course!
Two communities – Hampton, Virginia, and Placentia, California – will share how residents have contributed their views on budget matters. In Hampton, City Manager Mary Bunting will discuss the I-Value effort in Hampton. In Placentia, Rosanna Ramirez, the city’s director of administrative services, will talk about the city’s Citizens Fiscal Sustainability Task Force.
This webinar is part of the All-America City Promising Practices series and we shared more information about this offering earlier on the NCDD blog – read it here!
REGISTER: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/aac-promising-practices-webinar-engaging-the-public-in-fiscal-matters-tickets-53114553058
Tufts University will award a Post-Doctoral Fellowship to a scholar with expertise in American political behavior and survey data analysis for the 2019-20 academic year. The Fellowship is partly funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation and will be awarded to a scholar with a Ph.D. in Political Science or a related discipline with research interests that intersect with the Cooperative Congressional Election Study (CCES). Applicants should have completed the requirements for their Ph.D. by the time of appointment, which is planned for August 1st, 2019.
The post-doc will be located at Tufts University in the Department of Political Science and in the Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life. The primary responsibilities for the successful candidate will be to assist with the release and analysis of the 2018 CCES. The post-doc will work directly with Professor Brian Schaffner and will help prepare technical materials related to the CCES, in addition to being involved in planning for the 2020 CCES. In addition to working on their own research, the post-doc will also be expected to collaborate on CCES-related research papers with Schaffner and the other CCES co-PIs, with the aim of producing several publications in peer-reviewed outlets. The post-doc will also have the opportunity to work on research for other projects in Tisch College, including the Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (CIRCLE) and the Institute for Democracy & Higher Education (IDHE). The post-doc will have the opportunity to participate in the Summer Institute of Civic Studies (a seminar for faculty, advanced graduate students, and practitioners) at Tisch College from June 20-28, 2019 and will be expected to be part of the Tisch College community, attending talks and events.
Qualifications
Scholar with a Ph.D. in the field of Political Science or in a related discipline who is not yet tenured. Proficiency in Stata or R statistical programs.
Application Instructions
All applications must be submitted via http://apply.interfolio.com/58630 Applications should include: (1) a cover letter which includes a description of your research plans, particularly as they relate to the CCES; (2) your CV; (3) one writing sample; and (4) three letters of recommendation which should be uploaded by your recommenders to Interfolio directly.
Review of applications will begin February 1, 2019 and will continue until the position is filled.
Questions about the position should be addressed to Professor Brian Schaffner at brian.schaffner@tufts.edu.
Non-Discrimination Statement
Our institution does not discriminate against job candidates on the basis of actual or perceived gender, gender identity, race, color, national origin, sexual orientation, marital status, disability, or religion.
Tufts University, founded in 1852, prioritizes quality teaching, highly competitive basic and applied research and a commitment to active citizenship locally, regionally and globally. Tufts University also prides itself on creating a diverse, equitable, and inclusive community. Current and prospective employees of the university are expected to have and continuously develop skill in, and disposition for, positively engaging with a diverse population of faculty, staff, and students. Tufts University is an Equal Opportunity/ Affirmative Action Employer. We are committed to increasing the diversity of our faculty and staff and fostering their success when hired. Members of underrepresented groups are welcome and strongly encouraged to apply. If you are an applicant with a disability who is unable to use our online tools to search and apply for jobs, please contact us by calling Johny Laine in the Office of Equal Opportunity (OEO) at 617.627.3298 or at Johny.Laine@tufts.edu. Applicants can learn more about requesting reasonable accommodations at http://oeo.tufts.edu.
If you are looking for ways to improve your public participation skills or gain more tools, then we encourage you to check out the upcoming 2019 IAP2 USA Skills Symposium happening February 25 – March 1 in Austin, Texas. Hosted by NCDD member org, the International Association for Public Participation (IAP2), the Symposium is a valuable opportunity to dive deep into P2 (public participation), connect with fellow P2 professionals, and experience a variety of methods, techniques, best practices, and more. The Early Bird discount pricing ends this coming Friday, December 14 – so act quickly to take advantage of this great discount! You can read the announcement below and find more information on the IAP2 site here.
Are you troubleshooting current processes, or looking back, and thinking “there has to be another way?” The 2019 IAP2 USA Skills Symposium is just the place to meet other professionals in your field and acquire applicable tools and techniques to help you glean knowledge from the past, and streamline your processes in the future.
Early Bird pricing ends December 14, 2018!
The 2019 IAP2 USA Skills Symposium will offer a variety of training in public participation processes and methods. Join us in Austin, Texas dive into courses covering a range of topics including: mastering facilitation skills, using social media, and working with an angry public. Other topics include designing for diversity, and evaluating public participation initiatives. 1, 2, and 3 day courses are offered featuring experts in the practice of in community engagement. Attendees will engage in hands-on exploration and leave with many lessons learned on designing and managing effective public participation.
Are you an APA AICP? Did you know that ALL Skills Symposium Courses are eligible for AICP Certification Maintenance Credits? To learn more, check out their website!
Please click here to view the schedule-at-a-Glance, course fees, hotel room block information, and more!
Questions? Comments? Contact amelia@iap2usa.org
You can find this information on the IAP2 site at www.iap2usa.org/2019sksymp.
These are examples of social theories that emphasize inevitability:
One thing that unites the disparate authors in our canon of Civic Studies authors is a refusal to accept any of these forms of inevitability.
Elinor Ostrom was part of the rational choice tradition, but she argued that whether we succumb to collective action problems–including today’s peril of climate change–depends on how we organize ourselves. It is neither a tragedy nor a comedy but a “drama.” She found that bottom-up solutions sometimes worked, and their chances of working depending on whether the participants used smart practices.
Jürgen Habermas came out of the Frankfurt School, which had assumed that capitalism inevitably blocks free inquiry and emancipatory reason. He also read theorists like Dewey, for whom (at least in my interpretation) emancipation is inevitable. Habermas holds, instead, that how well we reason and deliberate depends on how we organize our public life, and we have a chance to improve it if we work hard and wisely.
Gandhi and Martin Luther King confronted people who were deeply skeptical of nonviolent resistance, as well as quietist religious believers who preferred to wait for providence to sort things out. Their constant refrain was that we have a chance to improve the world if we try. Social science confirms that civil resistance sometimes works–and more often than violence does–although it depends on how the resistance is organized. During the century after Gandhi’s youth, the record of civil resistance improved, as activists learned better tactics, but lately, its record has gotten worse due to the autocrats’ ability to learn from their experience.
A major 20th century debate was about the relative importance of structure versus agency. Is history driven by inevitable processes or by intentional human action? The answer to that empirical question is: Some of both. But a much better question is: How can we enhance the better forms of human agency? The role of theory is not to weigh the past impact of structure and agency but to make agency more important in the future.
See also: beyond civic piety; Ostrom, Habermas, and Gandhi are all we need and Habermas, Ostrom, Gandhi (II).
It’s amazing how fast time has gone by since the last time we did a round up of our favorite D&D podcasts! Since it is such a great time of year to pop on a podcast and hibernate, check out the recent list we compiled dedicated to dialogue, deliberation, democracy, and engagement work, to boost you through the chilly months. We’ve added several more podcasts from our D&D community that we’ve found along the way since our compilation last time. Let us know in the comments below what podcasts you’ve been listening to lately and/or share some of your longtime favorites!
Podcasts focused on D&D:
Standalone episodes related to D&D:
Don’t forget to check out the NCDD podcast too!
Stay tuned to the blog as we work to release more NCDD podcasts in the future! We recently launched our end-of-the-year fundraiser and one of our main asks is to fund the NCDD podcast. We have a lot of great ideas in store that we would love to share with you and we encourage you to consider donating to NCDD in show of support to the larger dialogue and deliberation community or join as a member!