9to5 would like to provide participants at the USSF with a Organizing Training designed to help women understand the process involved in creating public policy, how to organize members of their various communities to expand awareness about an issue impacting them, bring visibility to the public policy dialog and get the policy successfully passed through the legislature utilizing the example of the Family Medical Leave Act passed 12 years ago and current public policy campaigns such as the Minimum Wage Campaign and the Parent Protection Act. The workshop is connected to the theme to encourage thinking and acting that will support movement building activities designed to advance the struggle for social and economic justice. 9to5 has been building a movement for the advancement of economic justice for working women for over thirty (30) years. This workshop will expose participants to methods of movement building that have been successful in winning Work/ Family friendly legislation such as the passing of the Family Medical Leave act 12 years ago.

The goal of the workshop is to get local women earning low wages and other low wage earning citizens involved in the current local public policy campaigns that could benefit working women and their families, as well as, to provide women and working families visiting from other states with national resources and streamlined information that could be used in their communities to help organize citizens around issues such as welfare reform, creating living wage ordinances, advancing pay equity for women and people of color, and securing paid sick leave for working families. The target audience for the workshop is women of all lifestyle persuasions and ethnicities, working women, moderate and low wage earning families, women of color. Participants will be engaged in interactive dialogs, are given the opportunity to not only explore their human rights, but also taught how to enhance their advocacy and public speaking skills so that they can positively impact their communities and empower their families.

The workshop will last an hour and a half to two hours. Participants are provided with handouts that will include quizzes, interactive role-plays, and helpful advice. In addition to presentations made by 9to5 staff, the workshop will also consist of engaging discussions and a question/ answer session. The workshop will be delivered in English and Spanish interpretation is available through 9to5 staff, though 9to5 does not own or have access to any translation equipment. 9to5 has a variety of spokes persons and community organizers capable of providing the training, including Linda Meric, Executive Director, Cindia Cameron, Organizing Director of the National Association of Working Women, and Yomara Velez, National Job Survival Hotline Organizer, all of whom are bilingual.

9to5’s biggest challenges to our movement, for the advancement of social and economic justice, are the conservative republicans and democrats that oppose work flexibility expansion efforts and work/ family friendly legislation and the lack of civic involvement by our target audience, moderate and low wage earning women. 9to5 is engaged in an aggressive grassroots membership campaign to increase the membership base of our 8 national chapters. The local Atlanta chapter has designed an outreach plan to grow membership and involve more working women, their families and various networks in campaign advocacy efforts. The Atlanta Chapter has begun chapter building activities in north (Rome) and south (Savannah) Georgia. We plan to have several of these new members at the USSF to share their stories as a component of the workshop.