​vision.  learning.  integration.  transformation.​

The Learning and Action Circles (LACs) provide a great opportunity for our ROC DC team, including myself, to hone in on specific skills sets that are central to our work in an intimate setting curated and accompanied by Movement Matters, with the participation of fellow regional organizers who understand our challenges and strengths. My favorite part is the ongoing opportunity to continue to make new connections, and grow stronger bonds with other organizers and organizations with similar goals and missions.
Candace Cunningham,
Technical Assistance & Training Alumni.


Learning and Action Circles​

Movement Matters Learning and Action Circles (LACs) are generative spaces that cement participants' capacities and skills in the areas of relationship, constituency, and power building while also deepening the learning from our Community Organizing and Popular Education Institute, Advanced Training Series, and our tailored ​Technical Assistance. 

​With the recognition that our personal well-being and the strength of our change work are interconnected, the LACs also incorporate restorative and self care activities with a community focus. Using culture, ritual, somatics, expressive arts, movement, and other holistic modalities, participants have the opportunity to learn and restore in community, while practicing skills to bring to their own groups. 

​To the best of our abilities, we provide our alumni with tailored support, including preparing for these sessions, so that they can get the most out of our time together and apply the learning thoughtfully and successfully to their work. 

  • Learning and Action Circles (LACs)

    We heard clearly from our alumni that there is a strong need for anti-oppression spaces for organizers, popular educators, and community leaders to continue building our skills and applying what we learn on an ongoing basis. ​The lack of staffing capacity at our organizations often leaves us overwhelmed and barely able to keep up with immediate demands in front of us, with no ability to reflect and improve upon our work. That is simply unsustainable. 

    Ranging in approach from a single shared workshop to an advanced multi-month practice that can enhance organization-wide systems, our Learning and Action Circles (LACs) are accompanied laboratories where each participant can bring their ongoing projects and have the opportunity to cross-pollinate ideas with peers, access shared resources, get support in planning and implementation, deepen their own skills and capacity, and assess growth.​​
    Focus Area 1: The Work​
    Reflections and practices on how to shift and deepen our organizing and movement work of relationship building, constituency building and power building to creatively and strategically respond to the current moment.
    Focus Area 2: The Personal
    Deepening our well-being and internal relationship building through the use of somatics, ritual, culturally grounded expressive arts, movement and dance to keep us resilient in the face of the challenges we confront.

    Connect with us if you are interested in our LACs.

  • Circles of Practice (CPs)

    Movement Matters’ Circles of Practice (CPs) are a cohort-based model designed to help organizers develop the muscle memory of particular skill sets through collective practice, reflection, and systems development. It is a 7-month laboratory in which participants take concepts and approaches learned in Movement Matters’ Community Organizing and Popular Education Institute and Advanced Skills Trainings and receive support in applying them to their regular organizing practice.

    A key component of the CPs is the collective implementation and practice of organizing skills. The cohort meets on a monthly basis to apply new skills in real time to the various organizing projects of cohort members, taking “classroom knowledge” and bringing it into the real world. To date, post-training integration of lessons learned has relied on the individual organizer, with intermittent collective reflection through Movement Matters’ traditional Learning & Action Circles. With the addition of the Circle of Practice, organizers receive more structured support and a collective space in which to practice, hone, and implement new approaches.

    As with all of our work, the CPs are  grounded in Movement Matters' organizing framework of relationship building, constituency building, and power building. The CPs also incorporate time for community building and wellness—both to deepen relationships with other organizers as well as to model how to facilitate decolonized, transformational spaces of culture, ritual, relationship building, and somatic restoration with community members.
    ​​
    2024 Circle of Practice (CP): Membership Development
    Building a Culture of Engagement, Building Engagement Through Culture
    ​
    For 2024 we have created a 7-month multilingual laboratory (Spanish/English) for the consistent and focused application of popular education and cultural organizing to participants’ member development and engagement processes.​ Read our blog post for more details.
    Focus Area 2: The Personal
    Deepening our well-being and internal relationship building through the use of somatics, ritual, culturally grounded expressive arts, movement and dance to keep us resilient in the face of the challenges we confront.

    Connect with us if you are interested in our Circles of Practice.

  • Healing and Action Circles (HACs)

    Our Healing and Action Circles have been tailored to a variety of needs including:
    • public speaking and outreach skills-building for immigrant restaurant worker-leaders during COVID;
    • supporting team transitions with a focus on re-creating self-assessment and communications systems; and
    • creating community mourning and celebration spaces.

    We continue to incorporate culturally and community-rooted somatic and ritual practices that decolonize and support our voices, bodies, hearts, and deepen our connection to each other, to the earth and spirit.
    ​

    Community Healing & Action Circles (CHACs)

    We began offering Community Healing and Action Circles (CHACs) in the first pandemic summer (2020) with the recognition that community members leading campaigns to support and create change are lacking spaces to heal and grow together. 

    Our first series was developed for laid-off restaurant workers who organized themselves during the pandemic. The worker leaders asked for a space to deepen their resilience, to care for themselves and their bodies, and to build their public speaking and outreach skills as members at the forefront of a significant local campaign. 

    We created spaces of radical joy, reflection, and trust building by using culture, expressive arts (including dance, movement and popular theater), breath work, self-massage, medicinal plants, ritual, story creation and story telling to center healing, self-care/self-regulation, resiliency, and the decolonizing of voice, microphones, and 'public speaking' in its entirety.

    Our series included:
    • Breath, Movement, Voice
    • Resilience, Story Creation, Building a Base
    • Our Healing Traditions, Individual and Community Self Care

    The Community Healing and Action Circles (CHACs) are intentionally structured to build resilience within a community context. Participants are not just isolated individuals, but leaders of change efforts who are deeply connected to their constituencies. We mindfully cultivate each session to meet the emerging needs of the work, campaigns, and the broader membership of participants, ensuring that healing and capacity building are being integrated into the larger organizing community.

    The CHACs were developed in conjunction with our Learning and Action Circles and our Dismantling Anti-Blackness Among People of Color work, both of which are oriented toward organizers and professional staff.
    ​

    Connect with us if you are interested in our Healing & Action Circles.
Wow! What to Say? I think this was the first time since physical distancing started that I felt truly part of a community again and I am so deeply grateful for that. I don't know how you all pulled that off over Zoom but it was such a healing and magical experience.

​Movement Matters really cultivated a space that felt safe and open virtually, where we could take care of ourselves and hold space and be with one another. I am truly grateful for you all! 
​Technical Assistance & Training Alumni,
​ONE DC.
To request information about our Learning and Action Circles, connect with us.
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Movement Matters is based in Washington, DC.
We work regionally and with national partners.
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