The Interactivity Foundation, a national civic organization dedicated to strengthening everyday democracy through structured community discussion, has launched a nationwide Discussion Club initiative and is accepting host applications through July 12, 2026. The program connects six to twelve consistent community members in monthly in-person conversations on topics ranging from mental health and loneliness to immigration and civic life, with hosts receiving facilitation training, community resources, and a $1,000 stipend to support participation. By combining accessible structure, practical facilitation tools, and a national host network, the initiative offers a replicable model for building social trust and dialogue capacity at the grassroots level. This work aligns directly with NCDD's mission to deepen civic engagement and expand the reach of dialogue and deliberation practice across American communities.

The National Civic League's 2026 All-America City Award Event, taking place June 26–28 at the Grand Hyatt Denver, brings together twenty finalist communities to present their civic health and trust-building efforts under the theme "America at 250: Strengthening Civic Health and Building Trust." The event features jury presentations by finalist communities, keynote addresses from philanthropy, government, and nonprofit leaders, peer learning workshops, and a new It's Your America Workshop designed to deepen civic practice. Individual registration is open at $150 per person, providing full access to all programming, receptions, and the awards ceremony. This event offers NCDD members and civic practitioners a timely opportunity to witness and connect with community-level democratic engagement at a pivotal moment in American civic life.

Essential Partners, a Cambridge-based nonprofit and leading voice in dialogue and conflict transformation, is offering Constructive Communication in the Classroom and School, a June 30, 2026, online workshop designed to help educators build practical skills for navigating division and polarization in educational settings. Facilitated by Dr. Jill DeTemple and Dr. Noemi Vega Quiñones of Southern Methodist University, the workshop grounds participants in a constructive communication framework emphasizing dialogic listening, inquiry, and reflective speaking across difference. Educators leave equipped with a ready-to-deploy ten-lesson curriculum and a professional development certificate, making the training immediately actionable in classroom and school community contexts. This offering exemplifies the kind of practitioner-focused, equity-minded dialogue work that NCDD's network champions as essential to democratic education and civic health.

The National Coalition for Dialogue and Deliberation offers a foundational introduction to the two core practices at the heart of its network's work: dialogue and deliberation. The post explains dialogue as a process for building genuine understanding across differences — not winning arguments, but hearing experiences — and deliberation as the structured examination of options and trade-offs that allows communities to make better decisions together. Drawing on the insight that moving from talk to decision requires trust as a foundation, the piece makes the case that these processes are most powerful in sequence and most necessary now, when polarization and distrust are eroding the civic spaces where communities once worked through hard things together. This explainer serves NCDD's mission by equipping new and returning visitors with a clear, accessible entry point into the dialogue and deliberation field and the network that supports it.

Harmony Labs, a media research organization, has released a series of findings from its multi-year partnership with Democracy 2076, examining how entertainment media shapes Americans' beliefs about government and democratic participation. Drawing on behavioral data from more than 300,000 opt-in panelists and content analysis of thousands of streaming programs, the research finds that 58% of scripted streaming content Americans watch daily is government-relevant — and that stories set in schools, workplaces, and community organizations can be as civically formative as those set in government itself. The lab has also released the Democracy Audience Map, a free values-based segmentation tool identifying eight distinct ways Americans relate to democratic institutions, offering civic communicators and practitioners a data-grounded framework for audience strategy. This research enriches NCDD's mission by equipping dialogue and deliberation practitioners with evidence-based insights about the media landscape in which civic engagement — and disengagement — is being shaped.

UConn's Democracy and Dialogues Initiative, co-directed by History Professor Brendan Kane and Nana Amos of the Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute, hosted a four-hour student retreat in March 2026 that equipped campus leaders with practical tools for facilitating constructive dialogue across difference. Drawing on frameworks developed in partnership with Essential Partners and Everyday Democracy, the program grounds participants in the neuroscience of conflict response and trains them to move from defensive reaction toward reflective, curiosity-driven communication. The retreat's peer facilitation model — combining structured listening exercises, role plays, and real-time practice — offers a replicable approach for higher education institutions seeking to build dialogue capacity among student leaders. This work directly advances NCDD's mission by embedding dialogue and deliberation skills into campus culture at a moment when civic communication competencies are urgently needed.

Essential Partners is hosting an online Dialogue Experience on June 16, 2026, offering a complete three-hour introduction to its Reflective Structured Dialogue methodology through a live, facilitated dialogue on the topic of America@250, led by EP-trained facilitator Meg Griffiths. RSD is Essential Partners' signature framework for building relationships and healthier communication dynamics across big differences in identity, values, and perspective — and this event is designed to be experienced rather than observed, giving participants a direct encounter with the structures and facilitation approach that make it effective. Participants will leave with a grounded understanding of RSD's theory and practice and a clearer sense of how it might apply to their own communities and work. For NCDD members seeking to deepen their facilitation toolkit or explore a proven methodology for dialogue across difference, this event offers an accessible and high-value opportunity to engage firsthand with one of the field's most respected approaches.

​The Minnesota Council on Foundations has launched the Minnesota Civic Resilience Fund, a one-time pooled grantmaking initiative distributing $300,000 in $25,000 grants to approximately twelve Minnesota-based 501(c)(3) nonprofits conducting nonpartisan voter engagement, civic education, and community organizing work ahead of the 2026 election. The fund prioritizes strategies that build civic capacity, expand voter participation, counter disinformation, and actively defend voting rights — with particular emphasis on historically underrepresented communities and broad geographic reach across the state. Applications are open through June 22, 2026, with funding decisions expected in early July. For NCDD members and partners working in Minnesota's civic ecosystem, this fund offers both immediate resources and a model of coordinated philanthropic investment in the relational and structural foundations that make democratic participation possible.

The Center for Inclusive Democracy (CID), founded and directed by Mindy Romero, Ph.D., will launch as an independent national organization on July 1, 2026, transitioning away from its previous university affiliations to operate with greater focus and decisiveness at a moment when the integrity of nonpartisan democracy research requires institutional independence. With Sierra Health Foundation serving as its new fiscal sponsor, CID will continue producing rigorous, data-driven research on voter participation, electoral access, and civic engagement while expanding into new educational outreach programs, customized community data tools, and deeper direct engagement with community partners across the country. The organization's sixteen-year track record — informing the work of election officials, policymakers, and civic organizations at the state and national level — has earned it broad recognition as a trusted, nonpartisan resource in the democracy field. CID's commitment to closing the gap between democratic ideals and lived civic experience aligns directly with NCDD's mission to strengthen inclusive participation and ensure that dialogue and deliberation are accessible to all communities.

​Voting should be easy, and cheating should be hard. The Trustworthy Elections initiative is a community-based effort to strengthen public trust in elections by helping people learn how elections work, engage across differences, and build relationships within and across communities. We are inviting local leaders—including civic leaders, librarians, faith leaders, facilitators, educators, election officials, and engaged community members—to help shape and support this work in ways that fit their communities. Join us for an informational call on Thursday, June 4, at 9:00 am Pacific / 12:00 pm Eastern to learn more about the initiative and opportunities to get involved - register here! The initiative is being convened by Living Room Conversations, Interfaith America, NCDD, AllSides, and Civity, alongside a growing network of civic leaders. Read more in the blog post below.