NCDD is excited to announce our full lineup of sponsorship opportunities are now available for the upcoming 2023 conference! Below is our invitation to sponsor, followed by details on where to find more information, and how to sign up. ​

Many of us are grappling with how to help communities bridge divides and collaborate meaningfully together. The National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation has a long history of doing this work. We are also a scrappy nonprofit, long overdue for full-time staff and programmatic support.

Many funders and organizations are looking to support efforts that strengthen democracy at this important moment in our history. NCDD sponsorship is a way to make this contribution that offers a multitude of benefits to you as an organization. Your support directly enables the production of our conference, and helps us to bring our staff to full-time capacity. 

As you may have heard, we are thrilled to announce that NCDD’s National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation is back for its 9th year in person! Our biennial conferences convene hundreds of the most active, thoughtful, and influential people in public engagement and group process work across the U.S., Canada, and throughout the world. Nearly 5,000 people have attended NCDD’s national and regional events, and we expect to have about 500 attendees join us in Atlanta. Your support makes mobilizing global change possible. 

BECOME A SPONSOR TODAY! Explore NCDD's Sponsorship Brochure and various levels of support  here. Contact Courtney@ncdd.org to sign on now as a sponsor. 

Sponsorship is crucial in a post-2020 environment. We can’t do it without you! Your patronage of the NCDD conference is a strong signal of leadership in and commitment to public engagement and community problem solving in our growing community of practice. 

Partnering with us via sponsorship has tangible benefits,  and instant, public, prestigious name recognition during and after the event. These highly desired sponsorship placements are a windfall for your brand, as you’ll simultaneously build good will and name recognition.

We work with the leading innovators in the field, and our sponsors are the benchmarks of that progress. By sponsoring NCDD 2023, you will be featured as one of the pioneering leaders in dialogue and deliberation. That’s something to talk about!

Becoming an NCDD Sponsor - Expands Reach and Increases Impact

As an NCDD sponsor, you are playing a major role in promoting knowledge-sharing and networking among dialogue and deliberation professionals, community leaders, and public managers. Your help is strengthening the capacity of people in our field to bridge divides and solve complex community challenges.

Your sponsorship dollars come with other benefits. We are an extremely lean-running organization, and your sponsorship means NCDD can hire full-time staff this year, continue to produce our world-class conferences, give conference scholarships, and ensure the inclusion of diverse populations in our field. 

Your sponsorship develops the field, enhances professionals, and increases the efficacy of our dialogue and deliberation offerings. In a post-COVID era, these small asks accomplish big things. 

Peruse the full brochure outlining all opportunities here. 

We hope to add you to the ranks of sponsor for NCDD 2023. Reach out to courtney@ncdd.org with your questions, or to support this event!

Two weeks ago, NCDD celebrated 20 years of connecting people who care about the way we talk with one another with an exciting and lively event. Thank you to everyone who joined us for this hybrid event, and to the many of our network members who shared remarks for the event and/or contributed a photo for our 20th Anniversary photo project!

If you were not able to join us live, we have now uploaded the video of the event here. Please check it out, as it captures much of this amazing network over the last 20 years, and talks about what we can continue to work on together. Plus, you can check out the announcement we made about our next national conference!

NCDD is excited to announce our next webinar featuring NCDD Member Org EnCiv! Join us on Tuesday, December 13th from 1-2pm Eastern/10-11am Pacific for this FREE webinar sharing more about the development of EnCiv's "Undebates" tool.

EnCiv is a nonpartisan organization looking to challenge sensationalism and polarization in civic discourse by offering social technologies that power widespread, cross-partisan discussion and better decision making. In this webinar, we'll be joined by David Fridley and Adolf Gundersen who will provide us with an overview of their latest tool, Undebates, and talk with us about other discussion processes where a platform of this sort could be helpful. He'll also discuss one such effort, called the Unroundtable. 

Register today to join us!

EnCiv - Undebates for Organizations
For organizations that are run democratically, getting members to participate - meaning vote, is a challenge.  They are forced to compete for people's attention from all the usual sources - social media, mass media, even streaming media.   EnCiv will demo a new tool that allows organizations to create "Undebates" for their elections.  It automates the process recording video Q&A with candidates and assembling it into an interactive viewer for voters to review on their own schedule and quickly decide, and it can be shared on social media, and embedded on a website.  The same process can also be used to present differing views on ballot measures.

For now, you are able to create an account and try it out for free. In this webinar we are also looking to brainstorm other forms of discussion processes to adapt this to, including what we call an "Unroundtable."  The challenge is to create connection between people at large scale when they can't all be in the same place at the same time.

Learn more about EnCiv and the Undebates tool at www.enciv.org/undebates.

NCDD is celebrating 20 years of connecting people who care about the way we talk with one another. By making a gift to NCDD this Giving Tuesday, you are helping us continue to connect and support this amazing community of practice, as well as continue to introduce more people to the communal power of dialogue and deliberation!

Your gift this Giving Tuesday will directly help us:

• Put together the next NCDD Conference in 2023!
• Offer more opportunities for members and the community-at-large to connect through webinars, networking events, and more
• Sustain NCDD’s staff (Courtney, Joy, & Keiva)
• And more!

Please consider a gift of any amount today at www.ncdd.org/donate. 

Or, consider supporting NCDD’s mission by becoming a member: www.ncdd.org/join. 

Thank you!

Those who joined NCDD for our 20th Anniversary Celebration last week were the first to hear our big announcement - the National Conference on Dialogue and Deliberation is back! After a hiatus due to COVID, we are so thrilled to reconvene our signature event in 2023.

​And, we shared another important opportunity that you'll want to read on to learn more about. 

About the Conference
NCDD 2023 will be held October 13-15, 2023 at the Crowne Plaza Atlanta Perimeter. A beautiful location perfect for the highly interactive conference, we are so thrilled to bring our event to the Southeast US for the first time! This will be a wonderful opportunity to connect with practitioners in the region, as well as showcase some of the wonderful work being done in the Atlanta area. 

If you haven't attended an NCDD conference before but want to learn more, check out this link.

Opportunity - Join or renew in 2022 to get the very best rate!
At our anniversary event we made another big announcement. We will be offering the lowest rate on conference registration to NCDD members whose dues are in good standing in 2022. That means if you have been thinking about joining or are behind on renewing your membership, now is the time to do it!

NCDD members all received discounted registration for our conference, but this is a special opportunity we're offering for an even deeper discount if you join or renew by December 31st. This helps support NCDD as we start what will be a very busy year, and gives you the very best deal on the conference!

Stay updated on the conference at our new event page: NCDD 2023

We can't wait to gather together with you all in 2023!

How to Get Involved ​
​Take a picture of yourself holding a sign or next to one that expresses (briefly!) what you would like to recommit to.

As we announced last week, NCDD is organizing a 20th Anniversary Event on November 17th, celebrating this wonderful network and it's contributions since its founding in 2022. 

We are inviting our network members to participate in a project that will be featured as part of this event. Inspired by the photo project we did for our national conference in 2012, we are creating a video comprised of photos submitted by our members that include a statement of how you are recommitting to this work and/or this community as we celebrate 20 years together. We have such a broad range of backgrounds, approaches, and perspectives amongst our members, so this is an opportunity to capture this diversity and passion and put it on display! The video will be used in the anniversary event and on the website.
 
How to Get Involved 
​
We are asking for submissions from network members through November 5th. Take a picture of yourself holding a sign or next to one that expresses (briefly!) what you would like to recommit yourself to.  For example, your sign might say:  " I recommit to helping students learn the practices of dialogue & deliberation," or " I recommit to helping my community engage with one another respectfully." 

We have created a template you are welcome to use - download that here.

But, feel free to be creative about your sign — you can use paper, flip chart easels, iPads, or other tools.  The photo should be bright and feature you clearly–we want to see all of your wonderful faces! The statement should be legible and in large enough text that it can be read from a distance. An example is included on the right.  

Don't forget to also include your first name, city and/or state, and country. It will be wonderful to see you all and where you are joining in from when we show the video during the event!

To submit your photo, please upload it using this form, or email courtney@ncdd.org. ​

As practitioners of dialogue, deliberation, and public engagement, it is important that we continue to improve our facilitation practice by learning new skills, understandings, and considerations for designing and facilitating conversations.

In the below sessions at this year's Summer Learning Springboard, participants will learn how to be self-reflective and intuitive. Register today to widen your skillset. 

Let’s think together about the work of dialogue and deliberation – how to we approach this work? How can we harness it for further good?

Register for the NCDD Summer Learning Springboard & participate in the sessions below that feature discussions about the important implications of deliberative practices. 

A Little Less Talk and a Lot More Action?
Reframing Dialogue & Deliberation as Formational Practices
Monday July 25
1:00-2:30 PM Eastern/10:00-11:30 AM Pacific
Hosts: Brad Rourke - Program Officer, Kettering Foundation; Elizabeth Gish - Program Officer, Kettering Foundation Pastor, Christian Church (Disciples of Christ); Katya Lukianova - Program Officer, Kettering Foundation; Michael Nygren - President, Live Your Best Life, Inc.

When we frame dialogue or deliberation as something other than action, we run the risk of missing the potential that D&D has to shape people, communities, and institutions. Taking part in deliberation and dialogue is an essential form of action that involves talking, listening, weighing, feeling, imagining, connecting, being seen and heard, and so on. When we take part in these practices, they shape who we are and have potential to shape the communities where we live. This 90 minute session engages participants in reframing the distinction between talk/action, suggests activities that can help explore this, and provides examples of the way that D&D has been a meaningful formational practice for individuals, communities, and institutions.

Can Deliberation Contribute to New Democratic Revival Movement?
Wednesday July 27
12:00-2:00 PM Eastern/9:00-11:00 AM Pacific
Hosts: Daniel Kemmis - Citizens Uniting to Restore Our Democracy & Wendy Willis - Founder and Director, Oregon's Kitchen Table Executive Director, Deliberative Democracy Consortium

Drawing on Daniel Kemmis' most recent book, Citizens Uniting to Restore Our Democracy, and Wendy Willis' recent thinking about how to bring grass-roots deliberation to constitutional reform, Kemmis and Willis will lead a highly interactive session on how practitioners and theorists of democratic deliberation might contribute to a 21st century movement of democratic renewal. Rather than thinking about deliberation as an end in itself, the session will examine how deliberative democrats might join forces with other democratic activists to address real barriers to reform and build a more just and functional democracy. 

Reframing Democracy Through the Wicked Problems Lens
Tuesday July 26
1:00-2:30 PM Eastern/10:00-11:30 AM Pacific
Host: Martin Carcasson - Director, Center for Public Deliberation at Colorado State University

​This workshop is focused on elevating our local conversations about shared problems by building local capacity to engage issues more collaboratively and productively through the use of deliberative engagement processes. Deliberative engagement involves interactive, often facilitated, small group discussions utilizing materials and processes designed to spark collaborative learning rather than merely the collection of individual opinions. An opening session will examine the concept of “wicked problems” as a framework to reframe difficult issues and review recent research on social psychology to help explain why traditional engagement processes are often counterproductive to sparking the high quality communication democracy requires.

Learn a new method for dialogue and deliberation – the Summer Learning Springboard is an opportunity to learn new approaches you might not be familiar with! 

This year's program includes several sessions which highlight practices that may be new to you. Check them out below and be sure to register to join us.