Community Organisers: host recruitment open

Locality is looking for up to 200 organisations around England to act as hosts for people training as community organisers.

The Community Organisers programme aims to strengthen communities and help them gain the relevant skills, knowledge and confidence to tackle local issues themselves. It will do this by recruiting and training a new generation of ‘community organisers’ who will work with local communities to build trust, respect and strong networks to collaborate on projects and campaigns set by local people.

The programme will recruit and train 500 senior community organisers, along with a further 4,500 voluntary, part-time organisers who will support them.

The hosts will play a vital role in the programme. They will recruit the 500 senior organisers from their local communities, offering them office space, support and guidance, plus the benefit of their in-depth local knowledge and networks. When the community organisers have completed their introductory training, hosts will help them ‘hit the ground running’.

Jess Steele, Director of Innovation at Locality, who runs the Community Organisers programme, said: “We’re looking for organisations around England who are established and well-rooted in their local communities. As an organisation you must care deeply about your local neighbourhood and be inspired by the potential of community organising. The support and guidance you can offer will be critical to each community organiser’s success.”

Locality will recruit between 100 and 200 host organisations between now and September 2014. Each organisation will host between two and five community organisers.

Hosts can be community, voluntary, educational or private sector organisations, but must be independent and locally controlled.

To apply to become a host organisation please see the how to become a host page of our site.