Bridging Team Facilitator Training
We can teach you.
If you’ve gotten this far into our website, you’re already interested in our Bridging Teams model, where we gather folks across economic lines to build relationships and change the conversation around poverty.
In our Bridging Team Facilitator Training (BTFT), we will take you through modules that will train you to facilitate your own Bridging Team.
This for you if …
You love to learn and grow in a small group setting
You’re intrigued by the possibilities of a Bridging Team.
You’ve absorbed the basics of the Bridges Out of Poverty philosophy
You have a support team and a co-facilitator (or some idea of where to get them).
You are inspired to create a new team for others to experience.
You are ready to join with other new Facilitators to meet monthly for mutual support, troubleshooting, and co-learning. Your Bridges coach will review lessons with you and your co-facilitator.
Join with a small group of like-minded adventurers exploring the process of starting up and sharing a life-changing experience of a Bridging Team.
Over the six weeks you will learn everything you’ll need to know to start and successfully run a Bridging Team.
You’ll learn about the logistics behind the team, including:
- How to organize the basic support systems needed behind the scenes
- How to raise the funds
- How to recruit participants
- How to trouble-shoot group dynamics
- How to use Evaluation tools to keep track of learnings and outcomes
You’ll become confident as a Facilitator who can:
- Create a safe, fun, participatory learning environment where trust and relationships can grow!
- Keep the team grounded in The Three Essential Practices of Hospitality, Curiosity, and Dignity, the foundations of the “bridge.”
- A variety of Facilitation tools and techniques that will keep the process participatory, fun, and flowing (eg. The Circle Way, Art of Hosting, Listening Triads, Icebreakers, etc.)
You’ll experience:
- The interactive, adult education, co-learning, of a Bridging Team
- Storytelling, Theory content, application of theory,
steps for preparation, reflection on your own unique challenges and goals… - Belonging to a cohort of Facilitators who meet monthly for mutual support, troubleshooting, and co-learning. Your Bridges coach will review lessons and tips with you and your co-facilitator.
Registration: $2,400 per participant
Includes: six weeks training on Zoom platform; a copy of the Manual; plus one year of coaching support.
NOTE: the full cost of the program represents five years of research & development. Your contribution to this learning represents another step towards the financial sustainability of the Bridges program.
However …
We are passionate about Bridging Teams … and the potential impact to your community. Please talk to us about a subsidy if the registration cost prevents your group from participating.
Applications are open now.
Please send a letter of interest with a brief summary of your context and hopes for starting a Bridging Team to: support@bridgespeterborough.ca
Questions? Email: lynn@bridgespeterborough.ca
Leaders
| Diaconal Minister Reverend Lynn Smith-Reeve (part-time Minister at Bethany Pontypool UC) brings extensive knowledge and creative energy as an educator and artist. Her lived experience of poverty – raising her five children and caring for a disabled husband on social assistance for two decades – and the support she received from a circle of mentors to journey out of poverty - inspired her to co-create the Bridging Team model. Lynn’s motto is, “It has to be fun.” Lynn’s story youtube video describes her seven year journey in under 4 minutes. |
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Rev. Allan Smith-Reeve is Project Coordinator and Host at Bedford House, and Coordinating Minister at Greenwood United Church in Peterborough, Ontario. He is an innovator and creator of many collaborative community projects, and has served both urban and rural congregations. He is passionate about bridging class, religious, and cultural divides. |
| Lynn and Allan will be joined by Facilitators from past and current Bridging Teams. Their stories will illustrate the joys and challenges of leading a group of strangers into this model of community to affect positive change. |