The mission of the Massachusetts Policy and Organizing Leadership Academy (The Academy) is to help leaders and organizations effectively and confidently participate in public life and influence the advancement of social, economic and racial justice.
Remembering Paul Cellucci

Remembering Paul Cellucci

Rest in peace Paul Celluci ,who always responded to poor people’s advocates— as a State Rep, as State Senator, as Lt. Governor, as Governor, as Ambassador. We called his official office in Canada and told a Secretary that an immigrantion lawyer from GBLS needed his official intervention to facilitate a...
Relationships Matter

Relationships Matter

When two hill town girls from Western Massachusetts get together in Florida – they have fun. Jane Swift and I go way back to our roots in Western Mass, to small town politics, to shared values and commitment to social, racial and economic justice as we pursued our separate careers...
Celebrating National Adoption Day - Like many women in this lobbying business I started as a volunteer 45 years ago.

Celebrating National Adoption Day – Like many women in this lobbying business I started as a volunteer 45 years ago.

Like many women in this business, I started as a volunteer. I belonged to an adoptive parent group. We had decided to “do something” about an existing law that forbade the adoption of children across religious lines. Through our parent support network we had learned that more than a thousand...
What People Are Saying

What People Are Saying

More important than ever – positive policy change on the state level. Here’s what professional and volunteer lobbyists and organizers are saying about the newly-released 2018 edition of Lobbying on a Shoestring, by Judith C. Meredith and Margaret E. Monsell: Making effective and lasting change is harder than ever but...
New! 4th Edition of Lobbying on a Shoestring Is Here!

New! 4th Edition of Lobbying on a Shoestring Is Here!

Lobbying on a Shoestring offers a common-sense, practical approach to political action. Premised on the idea that real people should have a real impact on the development of public policy, this powerhouse of a paperback conveys truths about the legislative process and hard-won, strategic insights. The 2018 Revised Edition gets you...
A Found Poem:  from an official training PowerPoint for workers  who screen shelter applicants.

A Found Poem: from an official training PowerPoint for workers who screen shelter applicants.

THE CHILDREN AND I NEED SHELTER – LAST NIGHT WE SLEPT IN A CAR ( Massachusetts found poem)* Where were you sleeping before you slept in the car? How many nights have you spent in the car? Were your children with you? Do you own the car? Do you have the...
Organizing for Change - Reorganizing Your Internal Resources

Organizing for Change – Reorganizing Your Internal Resources

I bet you can think of 10 MORE reasons why your organization might not want to spend the time and energy to reorganize you existing resources in order plan and implement a campaign to promote positive policy change in your town, in your county or in your state. I can...
New Videos from Freedom House + past Highlights

New Videos from Freedom House + past Highlights

Parents on the March: Organizing for Quality Education in Boston Public Schools, June 2012   Gail Snowden, from Freedom House, hosted the recent session on organizing for quality education in Boston and introduces two of Boston’s greatest education advocates and organizers Rep. Byron Rushing and Sarah-Ann Shaw.      ...
The most fun message training ever.

The most fun message training ever.

What kind of story do you tell?  So far, the most “fun” on-site coaching event is a very lively, interactive message development session which  helps volunteer activists and professional advocates learn how to turn a Chicken Little story that people ignore, into a Little Train that Could story, that makes people want to...
What Does it Take to Promote Positive Change in Our Communities?

What Does it Take to Promote Positive Change in Our Communities?

Answer: One person or organization, willing to be a part of a greater network, fueled by a common vision for the right solution.  Individuals, organizations, communities learning from each other, drawing from a comprehensive library of public policy resources and organizing tools.  Leadership Academy Training Programs: Be part of the Academy’s...
Do you have Real Clout?

Do you have Real Clout?

There’s no secret for how to win the policy change you’re looking for, just a series of planning and organizing activities that add up to a campaign.  Start by learning how the policy-making process works: the Real Clout textbook was written to serve as a how-to manual for community activists who,...
Latest entries
From Freedom House to Present Day, Parents on the March: June 19

From Freedom House to Present Day, Parents on the March: June 19

The Academy’s Organizing for Change series continues in June with a powerful presentation that will inspire and support today’s parents and organizers who are standing up for quality education in Boston. Join some of the local leaders who worked with Otto and Muriel Snowden, founders of the Freedom House in the 50’s and 60’s, and parents who are...
Post  - Clinton's Welfare "Reform" It's getting worser and worser.

Post – Clinton’s Welfare “Reform” It’s getting worser and worser.

Last week this article on the lack of support for the poor during this recession “My take on it was the states would push people off and not let them back on, and that’s just what they did,’’ said Peter B. Edelman, a law professor at Georgetown University who resigned from the Clinton administration to...
A Model Memo to Grassroots Activists

A Model Memo to Grassroots Activists

It doesn’t have to be fancy with a constant contact layout  or on a letterhead,  but it does need to be clear and specific. Please find here in its entirety a memo from from Lew Finfer to his grassroots activists working on youth development, violence prevention and youth jobs. There are 2 main asks to...
First Look - House Ways and Means Budget

First Look – House Ways and Means Budget

This Morning we salute our friends and colleagues at the Mass Budget and Policy Center for the rapid response analysis on the House Ways and Means budget. Find it here.  Trust me, its really really good. Faced with a significant budget deficit for Fiscal Year 2013, the House Ways and Means Committee (HWM) proposes to...
The Budget is Coming

The Budget is Coming

And the website where it will be posted around noon tomorrow is below. The Academy will be posting a quick update on some priority issues first thing Thursday morning, and then do a supplement post on Tuesday next that will list proposed amendments. Keep in touch! http://www.malegislature.gov/Budget/
What Would Frances Fox Piven Do?

What Would Frances Fox Piven Do?

When she found out that a special Legislative “Commission” had, after much public debate and little or no real data had proposed some punitive, unrealistic, unenforceable new laws to limit the use of EBT cards by welfare recipients? She’d say Please Urge Your Representative NOT to Sign Onto the O’Connell-Holmes Impractical, Costly and Unconstitutional EBT Bill.  And...
Talking the Talk with Barney Frank: June 12!

Talking the Talk with Barney Frank: June 12!

  Don’t miss what is certain to be a lively presentation about values-based messaging around delicate issues. Congressman Barney Frank will lead the discussion with his experience then and now talking about GLBT issues. From chicken little to the little train that could: Understanding how to develop a sympathetic public persona for your issue using community values...
Sen Pat Jehlen on the need for t-a-x-e-s to fix the MBTA

Sen Pat Jehlen on the need for t-a-x-e-s to fix the MBTA

So, Senator Pat Jehlen actually used the word in a State House News Video. In an election year. In the face of solemn promises from Legislative Leaders that there will be no new taxes, not to forstall threatened service cuts and fare increases that seem to be inevitable. So says the Transportation Secretary and the MBTA Acting General...
Lew Finfer in a 3 minute Video on Leadership for new and experienced organizers.

Lew Finfer in a 3 minute Video on Leadership for new and experienced organizers.

Here is Lew Finfer in a very brief, and very powerful 3 minute presentation on what it means to be a leader.  I have shown this to community activists to kick off a discussion about how they might strengthen their own leadership skills. Check it out here. 
Which Leaves on this Tree will Fall This Spring?

Which Leaves on this Tree will Fall This Spring?

De Leo’s budget chief, Rep. Brian Dempsey (D-Haverhill), told the News Service that a budget released in April by the House Ways and Means Committee will be balanced primarily with program cuts. The other day, our legislative leaders in the House, namely Speaker De Leo and Chair of Ways and Means Brian Dempsey both acknowledged...
Not just the Disabled are Worried about the MBTA's Ride -- Reading about Interest Rate Swaps

Not just the Disabled are Worried about the MBTA’s Ride — Reading about Interest Rate Swaps

” It’s gray, it’s white, it’s balding, and it’s coming.’’ says Christopher Hart of the Boston’s Institute for Human Centered Design about future users of the MBTA’s Ride. Today Eric Moskowitz wrote in the Globe this morning about a current Ride user profiling Penny Shaw…  BRAINTREE – Penny Shaw, a former teacher with a doctorate in French...

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