Volunteer Leadership Academy

Discover how justice, equity, diversity and inclusion fit in trail management. Learn about how to apply resources for engaging new people. Get best practices in social media and welcoming new folks.

After conducting listening sessions with club leaders, ATC looked for trends in the conversations. Outreach was the most prevalent obstacle mentioned, and one of the largest perceived challenges. Based on this need, ATC developed this track with the following sessions, at 6pm:

Online Training Modules are now available for these sessions:

JEDI: What is Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion? Duration (26:15)

JEDI: Revealing relevant history of the U.S. and A.T. for context of JEDI work Duration (31:54)

Preparing to put JEDI into Action: Step 1 Duration (52:34)

New Ways to Engage: Affinity Groups Duration (37:37)

New Ways to Engage: Next Generation Advisory Council  Duration (1:01:29)

Best Practices: Welcoming New Attendees (recorded on March 1, 2021, module available soon)

Best Practices: Social Media and Raising Public Awareness (recorded on on April 5, 2021, module available soon)

This series is primarily intended for, but not exclusively offered to A.T. Club and A.T. Community leaders.

Based on recent listening session studies and other research, one of the most common obstacles faced by volunteer leaders in A.T. clubs are the challenges associated with operational management.

There are two learning pathways under this topic:

The A.T. Cooperative Management sequence occurs over three sessions. These workshops center on the fundamental understanding all volunteers and volunteer leaders within A.T. clubs should have on the essential principles of A.T. management. The 3 sessions on Cooperative Management are a pre-requisite to the Volunteer and Project Leadership sequence of courses that follow.

Volunteers with existing exposure to A.T. Cooperative Management fundamentals of the first three courses below may skip to the final three modules in the series, which will be available as self-paced online training modules soon. Volunteer and Project Leadership is intended for Trail Supervisors and A.T. Club Presidents, as well as people aspiring to those roles.

Sequence 1: Cooperative Management

• Intro to Cooperative Management (September 24) – Now available as a training module
• Essential Agreements for Trail Management (October 22) – Now available as a training module
• Managing Beyond Trail Maintenance: Natural Resource Priorities, Understanding Advocacy, Discovering the Wild East Network, New Partnerships and People (January 21) – Now available as a training module

Sequence 2: Volunteer and Project Management

For club leaders, managing the Trail includes volunteer and project leadership. This sequence is a deep dive into planning, on the ground and one on one management. Volunteer and Project Leadership is intended for Trail Supervisors and A.T. Club Presidents, as well as people aspiring to those roles.

• Volunteer Management Responsibilities (February 18 – recording coming soon)
• Field Leadership Essentials (March 18 – recording coming soon)
• Trail Project Funding and Approvals (April 15 – recording coming soon)

What’s my time commitment?

Every workshop will last between an hour and an hour and a half. Most are scheduled for weekday evenings. Advanced reading or video viewing may be necessary in order to promote active discussion and participation during a given session.

The Engaging New People Track is 7 months and the A.T. Cooperative Management, Volunteer & Project Leadership Track is 6 months. Options may be available to register for just a sequence within a track, as is available in A.T. Cooperative Management, Volunteer and Project Leadership.

Organizational Leadership is different. The first session is 3.5 hours on a Saturday, and the subsequent cohort meetings will be determined by the members as a group.

Who is this for?

The tracks are intended for leaders (current and emerging) within A.T. Clubs, A.T. Communities, affinity groups and key partners. While designed for these audiences other volunteers with interest in the care of the A.T. are welcome to register to attend.

Any new club leaders or community should sign up for the A.T. Cooperative Management System. Volunteer and Project Management sequence is designed for field leaders and club presidents.

Who should attend?

Clubs are specifically requested to send at least one person in each category:

1.  A current or emerging club leader (a club president or soon-to-be-president, etc).

2. A field leader for the club’s A.T. management work.

The online nature of the Leadership Academy means that more participants from each club are welcome. If you know of others from within your organization who would have interest in participating, please send them here and encourage them to sign up for a track (or more!) of interest.

Will sessions be recorded if I can’t participate when a course is hosted? 

What will I get out of this?

Towards the end of March and into late July, ATC’s Volunteer Relations Department hosted a total of 78 individual interviews with A.T. volunteers.

A few major themes from this report include a need to strengthen club operational management and outreach. Findings also suggest that there is a substantial amount of existing strengths in these same obstacles. This highlights the variety of club circumstances and the fact that there is never a one-size fits all answer. The information gathered is a benchmark to chart our collective course forward and a springboard for greater network support in the form of training and shared resources.

Focused on creating opportunities for network capacity building by sharing knowledge, practicing skills and through a collaborative learning environment, the intent of this virtual academy is translation into meaningful experiences with real-world application for group leaders.