We’re excited to report that on February 4th, NCDD and the 6 other organizations in the CommunityMatters Partnership (a collective impact initiative launched by the Orton Family Foundation in June of last year), collaborated to run a workshop for 40 community leaders in Newport, Vermont. We wanted to pool our resources to offer tools and techniques to encourage broad citizen participation and improve local decision-making in a town that’s on the cusp of a lot of exciting developments that will greatly effect every resident. The one-day workshop on the 4th was ... (continue)

NCDD is the Core Collaborator of the highly regarded Dialogue, Deliberation and Public Engagement Certificate Program (DDP&E for short).  The certificate program is now hosted by Kansas State University, and the first course launches next month! We wanted to alert the NCDD community to an opportunity to learn more about the program next Wednesday at 5pm Eastern on an conference call with program leaders.  You can sign up here to participate in the call. I have heard nothing but great things about this program, which ... (continue)

We thought the community should know that two long-time NCDD members were struck by a bus in London this past weekend and remain in critical condition in separate London hospitals. As of yesterday, Terry Amsler and Lisa Bingham remain in critical but stable condition in medically induced comas and are on respirators. It goes without saying that this is a horrible situation and a blow to our field.  Terry and Lisa are a wonderful couple — two of the kindest and most accomplished people in our ... (continue)

We’re excited to announce the winners of the NCDD Catalyst Awards — two $10,000 prizes for team projects run by NCDD members in the areas of Civic Infrastructure and Political Bridge Building. The award winner in the Civic Infrastructure category is: A Collaborative Plan for a National Dialogue Network Infrastructure (main contact: John Spady) — The award winner in the Political Bridge Building category is: Real Dialogues: D&D Reality Show (main contact: Tim Bonnemann) NCDD intends to support the winning teams in whatever ways we are able ... (continue)

If you’re an NCDD member and you haven’t voted yet for the two $10,000 Catalyst Awards winners, today’s your last opportunity!  Voting will close tonight at midnight Pacific. The ten-day voting window is coming to a close, and we plan to announce the two winners (one each in the Civic Infrastructure and Political Bridge Building categories) tomorrow. If you didn’t receive your invitation to vote via email (from member@surveymonkey.com), send a message to our office manager, Joy Garman, at joy@ncdd.org asap. She’ll confirm that you’re a ... (continue)

This extraordinary post was submitted by NCDD supporting member Janice Thomson. Janice has been working in collaboration with UIC’s Institute for Policy and Civic Engagement to map the D&D terrain in Chicago, an effort which has led to the development of a new Community of Practice for dialogue and deliberation practitioners in the city. NCDD supports the effort and we hope to see other members launching similar efforts!  - Sandy From Janice… I honestly didn’t realize just how ambitious trying to understand the use of dialogue ... (continue)

Voting opens today for the NCDD Catalyst Awards — two $10,000 prizes for team projects run by NCDD members in the areas of Civic Infrastructure and Political Bridge Building. A special project run in conjunction with NCDD’s 10-year anniversary and 5th National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation, the Catalyst Awards were designed to tap into NCDD’s most valuable resource — our membership of 1,700 leaders and innovators in public engagement, conflict transformation, group process, and community problem solving. Using a combination of activities (our Seattle ... (continue)

On December 17th (three days after the Newtown tragedy), NCDD launched a collaborative workspace on Hackpad to help the dialogue and deliberation community think through how we might respond — both individually and collectively — to the shooting and all it surfaced. There has been a lot of activity on the Hackpad site at www.bit.ly/natdial, and I’ve been really impressed with the input and exchange that’s been going on.  We have pages there dedicated to sharing resources people can put to use immediately, debating about what ... (continue)

Here’s an announcement from CommunityMatters, a partnership that NCDD is involved in… The Citizens’ Institute on Rural Design (CIRD) is issuing a request for proposals to rural communities facing design challenges to host local workshops in 2013. Successful applicants will receive a $7,000 grant and in-kind design expertise and technical assistance valued at $35,000. The Request for Proposals is on the new CIRD website: www.rural-design.org. The deadline for submitting a proposal is Tuesday March 5, 2013 at 5:00 pm EST. CIRD (formerly known as “Your ... (continue)

This post is from Mark Frischmuth of DemocracyLab.org, who has been leading a group of NCDDers with expertise in online engagement to develop a proposal for the Catalyst Awards. If you’re interested in getting involved in this project now or down the road, add a comment to this blog post, with your name, organization, email and what role you might see yourself playing in this project. Dear NCDD Community: At the NCDD Conference in Seattle, a number of like minded D&D practitioners and social entrepreneurs got ... (continue)