TOOLS FOR CHANGE
Community Organizing Skills Workshops
Fairbanks Climate Action Coalition is excited to offer a regular training workshop series to our members and anyone involved in the broader justice movement in Fairbanks! These learning sessions focus on skills needed to run effective teams and build strong campaigns designed to build people power and win real changes in our communities.
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upcoming Trainings
The Fairbanks Movement Leadership & Training Cohort is seeking applicants who would like to grow their skills in grassroots organizing and training facilitation as part of our 2 month program. Hosted by the Fairbanks Climate Action Coalition, Fireweed Collective, and the Young Alaskans Training Fund, this cohort will learn the essentials of grassroots organizing training and work together to lead a series of trainings between March and May of 2026. This cohort is for community members who have some experience in grassroots organizing and would like to step up their leadership and build skills around teaching and training others.
Fairbanks Movement Leadership
& Training Cohort
What to expect:
Attending a weekend-long Training for Trainers from March 20 - 22
Co-planning and facilitating one of a series of four bi-weekly trainings between March 30 and May 11
Attending the three other trainings in the series as an observer and participant
Working with a team to grow and apply your skills to build up grassroots justice organizing in Alaska
PAST SESSIONS
De-escalation for protests and political action
May 2025
We love seeing folks planning community events and actions, and we know that sometimes being public comes with conflict. This interactive training taught skills to help reduce the intensity of conflicts during political actions- from tabling to rallies. We covered an introduction to the concept, how to deescalate yourself, and how to deescalate others so that your event or action can focus on your goals rather than on outside conflict.
Creative Tactics for Activists
April 2025
Creativen Tactics for Activists was a hands-on training designed to grow your practical skills in wheatpasting, spray paint stenciling, and poster making while diving into the principles of effective action arts. Whether you're new to activism or a seasoned organizer, this workshop will help you harness the power of street art to craft compelling messages, mobilize communities, and make change impossible to ignore!
What we taught:
-Wheatpasting basics: turning city walls into canvases for movement messaging.
-How to design and cut spray paint stencils for bold, repeatable protest art.
-Poster-making techniques that fuse creativity with effective action design.
-Key principles of action arts: why certain visuals stick and how to make yours count
How We Fight for Change & Win - Two Part Series
Part 1 - Organizing Your Community:
February 2025
Basics of how to organize your community to build people power and win the changes we need! Despite challenging times, we have power as organizers to build community connection, find alignment on the issues that matter, and take action together. This first session in a two-part series introduced the core principles of grassroots organizing, explore the power of social movements, and equip you with practical tools to empower yourself and your community to create lasting impact.
Part 2 - Building People-Powered Campaigns:
March 2025
How to plan a community-led grassroots campaign for change on the issues that matter! In this second session of the series, we dove deeper into the work of identifying an issue with your community, analyzing the power you have to influence it, and building an impactful strategy that will allow you to win.
Making Good Trouble: A Weekend of Non-violent Direction Action & Arts Training
October 2024
In October of 2024, we collaborated with our co-conspirators at Northern Center, Alaska Peace Center, and Young Alaskans Training Fund for “Making Good Trouble,” a two-day non-violent direct action workshop at the Dena’ Movement Commons. Trainers from across the state shared their knowledge and experiences in non-violent direct action, provided information on the philosophies of direct action, gave tactics and tools to help attendees start or further develop their campaigns, and guided campaign and art development, leading to the positive change we want to see in our communities!
Press Tactics for Activists
October 2024
At Press Tactics for Activists, the third in our Strategic Storytelling training series, we be crafted messages that can be used with the news media, using some of the messaging skills from the first two training sessions and practiced media spokesperson skills in small groups.
Strategic Storytelling Workshop
September 2024
In session 2 of our Strategic Storytelling series, we’ll dove deeper into how we tell the story of our work in a way that moves people into understanding and ultimately action in support of our cause and learned tools to reframe existing narratives in a way that can shift public understanding of an issue.
Intro to Strategic Storytelling
July 2024
In July we gathered to talk about some of the data behind good messaging, how this data applies in Alaska, and how we can apply it in climate justice or other kinds of social justice work. We got into the nerdy side of messaging tactics and broke down the data on how we can best tell the story of the issues we care about, and how to make the world we’re building irresistible.
Outreach & Recruitment
June 2024
Our community gathered to learn how to repare yourself to bring new people into the movement by honing your outreach pitch! Recruiting others with a direct ask is both one of the hardest and most important skills for building up a community campaign. This workshop helped attendees refine their approach and script for outreach conversations, perfect for feeling comfortable with summer tabling or making phone calls. We covered the basic principles of movement basebuilding, strategies for effective recruitment, and a chance to practice writing and sharing your pitch.
Gathering People & Leading Meetings
May 2024
We had a great turnout for our first training workshop in the Tools for Change series! People from FCAC, Fireweed, Native Movement, Northern Center, and members of the broader community participated in a productive session on learning the art of gathering and leading people in productive dialogue to accomplish shared goals! One of the most essential building blocks of social change is the ability to bring community members together to communicate and set goals for collective action. In this workshop, we had the opportunity to hone your skills for getting people to meetings and facilitating effective discussions. This training covered best practices for preparing, leading, and following up meetings as well as an opportunity to practice facilitation in small groups.