Skill Up Intensive (Summer 2025 Cohort)

Designed for facilitators who have already gone through our Fundamentals training, the Intensive is jam packed with tools and strategic approaches for facilitators guiding groups through decisions, conversations, and processes of collaboration in social justice work. A unique opportunity to learn alongside a cohort of fellow movement facilitators, the intensive creates opportunities for application through practice, role playing tricky meeting scenarios, and some seriously fun nerding out with other facilitators.

A sneak peek into what this experience will include:

• Analyzing your own past or upcoming meeting agendas, and using them to experiment with new sequences, tools, and strategies towards shared power in your group
• Recalling moments when a meeting didn’t go as planned, and learning new ways to pivot with clarity
• Work through multiple meeting scenarios with the group through role plays and lightning round agenda writing
• Connecting with other facilitators across movements for social justice in an online community platform in between sessions, and forming continued practice groups that last after the intensive is over

The Headwaters Skill Up! Intensive is for you if…

• You facilitate meetings about decisions, conversations, and processes of collaboration in social justice work.
• You are ready to dive into an intensive learning experience around anti-oppression group process facilitation practice.
• You are able, to the best of your knowledge, to attend all five dates of your selected intensive cohort in full.
• You feel full alignment with AORTA’s commitment to move groups that we facilitate towards: deep democratization and collective governance, developing many leaders, building resiliency and healing, and the practice of principled struggle
• You are ready and excited to invest in building relationships with your fellow intensive cohort members.
• You have or will have attended a Facilitate for Freedom Fundamentals Training.

We welcome you wherever you are in your facilitation journey - beginners and seasoned practitioners alike.

• 6/10/25, 9am-12:30pm PST/12-3:30pm EST, Process
• 6/11/25, 9am-12:30pm PST/12-3:30pm EST, Adapt

• 6/17/25, 9am-12:30pm PST/12-3:30pm EST, Intuition
• 6/18/25, 9am-12:30pm PST/12-3:30pm EST, Craft
• 6/25/25, 9am-12pm PST/12-3pm EST, Integration Day

• Zoom: We will be meeting via Zoom. If you have access to a computer or laptop, we encourage you to join the training by computer to make navigating the materials more easeful. During the training, we will be navigating between two windows: Zoom and a collaborative slide deck. We will not be using the screen share function.
• Breaks: In our training, we will be taking one 5 minute break and one 15 minute break. This break will be timed on the day of to adapt the needs of the group.
• Captions: We will be offering CART Captioning during the training.
• Chat: This training includes use of the chat function in Zoom. Participants will be asked to enter responses in the chat throughout the training.
• Training Materials: Before the training, each participant will be added to our Mighty Networks space where all session materials will be located. All sessions will be recorded and shared with participants.
• Tech and access support: A tech and access support person will be present throughout the training to attend to any emergent participant needs regarding Zoom, the slide deck, and access.

AORTA offers our public trainings at different rates depending on your individual and organizational access to money and wealth. Our sliding scale is an intentional effort to distribute resources equitably between organizations and organizers we work with.

Please reflect on the self assessment linked below to help you consider what rate to pay to attend this workshop.

https://aorta.coop/public-program-rates

These rates are for you if you are paying for the training without financial support from an organization. The cost listed below is for 1 person attending the full intensive.

• Solidarity: $420
• Sustain: $630
• Full Cost: $840
• Redistribution: $1260

These rates are for you if you are a member of an organization that is paying for your participation in the training. The cost listed below is for 1 person attending the full intensive.

• Solidarity: $2100
• Sustain: $3150
• Full Cost: $4200
• Redistribution: $6300

*Note: The rates above do not include eventbrite fees.

Group Registration: If you're an organization that would like to sign up more than 10 participants, please email [email protected].

Please note our refund, transfer, and cancellation policy for virtual trainings:

AORTA is a small business that depends on stable revenue from our trainings and offerings. As such, we are not able to make exceptions to our refund policy.

• All of our training fees are non-refundable.
• All registrants will receive a recording of the training.
• You may request a transfer of your ticket to a different date within the training series (e.g. a training in the Spring of a calendar year) if a spot is available at your selected ticket rate. Requests must be made more than 7 business days prior to the training. Transfers to a future training date are not available for the Skill-Up Intensive.
• Additionally, you can transfer your registration to a different participant (their name and email address must be shared at least 3 business days prior to the training).
• If AORTA needs to cancel the training (due to unforeseen circumstances, such as the trainer becoming ill), then we will do our best to reschedule the training for a later date. If you are unable to attend at the rescheduled date, or if AORTA is not able to reschedule the training, then you will have the option to be fully refunded, transfer you registration as outlined in 3 and 4 above, or convert your registration fees to a donation to support AORTA’s ongoing work to strengthen movements and organizations working for social justice.

Host or Publisher AORTA