Leadership Organizing & Action.
Leadership is accepting responsibility for enabling others to achieve shared purpose int he face of uncertainty.
-Marshall Ganz
Leadership, Organizing and Action
About Leadership Organizing and Action (LOA)
The Leadership Organizing and Action Project organizes Stanford students who dream of a better world to build a sustained and integrated culture of effective, values-based leadership and organizing on campus and beyond by providing a curriculum that guides Stanford students to identify their calling, build strong collective action efforts, and develop a network of on-campus coaches.
A joint program of the Haas Center for Public Service and the Office for Religions and Spiritual Life LOA provides programs, workshops and courses that enable people to ask three questions: Who are my people? What challenges do they face? How can they turn their resources into the power they need to meet these challenges?
People
Laurie Hahn Tapper
Rabbi Laurie Hahn Tapper’s passion is building values-based communities, places where people with intersectional identities can be their full selves in co-creating meaningful experiences. An Associate Dean for Religious and Spiritual Life in the Stanford University Office for Religious and Spiritual Life, Laurie works with a multifaith clergy team fostering communities of belonging and shaping spiritual wellness. Before coming to Stanford, she was the School Rabbi of Yavneh Day School for fourteen years, where she also served as the Rabbinic Advisor for the Jewish Community Relations Council. She is a graduate of Stanford (‘98) and the Jewish Theological Seminary.
Toni Kokenis
Toni Kokenis’ journey in campus activism and community organizing began as an undergraduate student at Stanford. A member of the women’s basketball team, Toni devoted her time off the court to creating more inclusive spaces on campus for LGBTQ and allied student-athletes. Inspired by her time at the Bay Area Women’s Sports Initiative running after school sports programming for elementary school children with and without disabilities, Toni moved to the East Coast to pursue a career in child advocacy. Toni currently serves as a staff attorney at Health Law Advocates Mental Health Advocacy Program for Kids, where she holds a law degree from Northeastern University and an M.Ed in Human Development and Psychology Child Advocacy from Harvard University. Since 2019, Toni has taught courses in public narrative and community organizing with Marshall Ganz at Harvard University, whose leadership and organizing framework are the basis for our Leadership, Organizing, Action Project course offerings at Stanford. Toni currently serves as the program director of the LOA Project, leading the fall fellowship training course and winter community organizing course. Toni graduated Stanford in 2015 with an M.A. in Sociology, B.A.s in Sociology and Human Biology, and Honors in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
Tiffany Steinwert
Tiffany Steinwert, Ph.D. became Dean for Religious & Spiritual Life at Stanford University in February of 2019. She previously served as Dean of Hendricks Chapel at Syracuse University and Dean for Religious and Spiritual Life at Wellesley College. Dean Steinwert brings with her experience as an ordained clergywoman, administrator, and a leader in spiritual life in higher education. At Stanford, Steinwert nurtures religious, spiritual, moral, and ethical education for students, staff, and faculty. She aims to build relationships amidst difference, and to cultivate healthy contemplative practices for the transformation of self and world. Trained as a practical theologian, her scholarly work explores emerging pedagogies for inter-religious education, chaplaincy in higher education, and contemplative studies.
Luke Terra
Luke Terra serves as an associate director of the Haas Center for Public Service and leads the center’s Community Engaged Learning and Research (CELR) programs. The CELR team supports faculty and students in connecting teaching and research to broader public concerns through community engaged learning courses and community-based research. Luke also serves as resident fellow in the Public Service House, an academic theme house for 78 undergraduates who share an interest in public service and civic engagement. In both these roles, Luke seeks to create opportunities for students to articulate the values that motivate them, deepen their knowledge and skills, and work collaboratively with others to pursue a more just and sustainable world.
Kristy Lobo
Kristy directs the Haas Center's leadership development activities including the Public Service Leadership Program and Issue Area Coordinators Program. In the courses she teaches and in the programs and cohort experiences she facilitates, her goal is to develop students' understanding of ethical and effective service principles and their skills related to public service pathways. Kristy also manages community partner engagement, events, and communication. Previously, she directed the Haas Center's advising and outreach team.
How to Get Involved
URBANST 127B: Leadership, Organizing and Action: Intensive (CSRE 127B, ETHICSOC 127B)
First Two Weekends of Winter Quarter: Community Organizing makes a difference in addressing major public challenges that demand full engagement of the citizenry, especially those whose voices are marginalized. In this course you will learn and practice the leadership skills needed to mobilize your communities for positive social change. We identify leadership as accepting responsibility to enable others to achieve shared purpose in the face of uncertainty. As organizers you will learn how to develop capacity within your community and analyze power dynamics to develop a strategic plan. By the end of this course, you will create an organizing campaign that builds power rooted in the resources of your community. The class will be an intensive held the first two weekends of winter quarter. Class begins on Friday in the afternoon and runs through early Sunday evening.
LOA Fellowship (LOAF)
Participating in LOAF enables students to take their leadership and organizing skills to the next level by becoming coaches in the pedagogy who empower other students learning. This fellowship is open to former students of the Leadership, Organizing, and Action intensive, as well as nominated student leaders.
LOAF fellows enroll in Urban Studies 127a: Community Organizing: People, Power Change (Fall) in which you learn how to become a coach, leader, and facilitator. And Urban Studies 127c: Leadership Organizing and Action: Campaign Coaching (Winter) in which you will apply your coaching skills by coaching students with their campaigns. Fellows also serve as coaches at the Fall Public Narrative Workshop and the Winter Intensive Course.
*Fellows will be compensated for their coaching at the workshop and course as well as future coaching opportunities available in the spring and beyond.
Bring LOA to Your Organization, Department, Community
Interested in building the leadership and organizational capacity of your organization, department, or community? Our team of trained coaches and facilitators is ready to support you!
Public Narrative: Storytelling for Leadership, Organizing and Action
This weekend intensive course provides an overview of the craft of public narrative, as participants will be introduced to story of self, story of us, and story of now. Story of self communicates our call to leadership - what choices have made us who we are and what values have shaped those choices. Story of us connects us to one another and articulates moments of hope experienced by the community. Story of now highlights an urgent challenge we are facing and asks us to act on our values to address that challenge. Participants will have a chance to draft and receive feedback on each of their individual stories of self, us, and now in small groups with an expert coach. This experiential course will support students in building tangible leadership skills that inspire their community during times of uncertainty to respond to challenges with agency rather than fear.
Resources
LCN
LCN is a global community of organizers, practitioners, educators, and researchers catalyzing change through the use of narrative and utilizing the pedagogy of community organizing. Looking to be part of a community of change makers and hone your organizing skills? Join the global network to take advantage of training opportunities and a broad community of support.