A Voice For the Voiceless
The Advocacy Project helps marginalized communities to tell their story, claim their rights and produce social change. We recruit graduate students to volunteer as Peace Fellows with partners.
The Impact of Service
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Work Plan
The Advocacy Project Work Plan: Responsibilities for all Peace Fellows
AP Peace Fellows are asked to follow a broad work plan, which reflects AP's own mission and seeks to help their host. Peace Fellows will work with AP and their host organization to tailor this work plan, as described in the individual job descriptions. AP will also provide training before Fellows depart for the field. Broadly speaking, Peace Fellows will work shoulder-to-shoulder with the staff of host organizations.
While the number of AP partners remains relatively constant, as does the AP mission for social change, the nature of our relationship with each of these organizations is different. AP partner organizations that receive Fellows are grouped into one of three categories, depending on their needs and the types of services provided by AP. However, during 2009 there will be a greater emphasis on the first service. All Fellows will be expected to profile their hosts through blogs, photos, video footage, and advocacy profiles.
The Fellow's work plan will reflect these various needs:
1. Partners that need to tell their story help their host profile stakeholders. This includes the following:
- Identify and define the partner’s social justice agenda
- Use photos, video, blogs and podcasts to tell the story of the host organization and its stakeholders
- Upload content to partner website or create temporary online presence for partner
- Produce content for press releases and AP Bulletins
- Produce content for their partner page on the AP website
2. Partners that seek to develop advocacy tools help the host to produce, disseminate and use information. This includes the following:
- Identify and train an information officer from the partner’s staff who can take on the task of producing information.
- Help the partner to produce a regular newsletter/bulletin which focuses on an “actionable” social justice issue.
- Work with partners to create press releases other informational advocacy tools
- Produce other types of new information/media to be used for advocacy and lobbying (short videos, documentaries, podcasts)
- Website (creation if necessary) update and maintenance
- Use ICT tools to reach or create network of organization or individuals for advocacy. These could include: online petitions; email lists; social networking (MySpace; Facebook; YouTube etc).
- Provide ICT trainings for staff.
- Identify sources for hardware and software
- Help partner define social justice campaign and create concrete goals
3. Partners that have launched social justice campaigns are supported in their advocacy work to produce further social change. This includes the following:
- Define social justice goals, outline campaigns and create demand to generate support for the partner’s social justice campaign.
- Perform monitoring and evaluation function to help hosts develop M and E tools, including indicators, and track results
- Use information and advocacy tools to help their hosts to refine and improve their information tools, and bring them to bear on the partner’s social justice campaigns.
- Local and international outreach to bring the partner’s message to the US, through presentations, speaking tours, press articles and promotional events.
- Draft proposals and raise funds jointly with host.
Peace Fellows are also required to conduct outreach, advocacy or lobbying efforts upon their return to their home country. This should be tailored to the individual host organization’s needs, but there remain certain activities that all Fellows must conduct:
- Identifying an organization to debrief and share your Fellowship experience with.
- Presentation to a government representative (in US, the Fellow’s member of Congress)
- Outreach and promotion of Fellowship program on campus (if applicable)