Embrace’s mission is to strengthen communities from the inside out. We do this by training, coaching, and connecting community cultivators through regional, national, and international learning cohorts, communities of practice, workgroups, and networks.
2023 Summary:
Learning Cohorts & Training Events 68 participants
ABCD Community Cultivators Network 191 participants
Regional, Affinity and Workgroup Members 167 participants
Coaching Clients 20 participants
Training Activities:
During 2023, Embrace facilitated four Power Shift Part 1 learning cohorts - SAFE, Caterpillar Ministries, United Methodist of Upper New York, and Heart of Virginia. We also launched a self-paced Power Shift Introduction and Part 1 online courses. In addition, we facilitated a collaborative ABCD 101 training through the ABCD Institute.
Our SAFE and Caterpillar cohorts allowed us to expand our network into North Carolina. Both organizations are grassroots community-based non-profits who are seeking to strengthen vulnerable communities.
United Methodist of Upper New York expanded our network into New York State through their first learning cohort which engaged pastoral leaders from eight different communities. A second learning cohort is in the works for 2024.
Our Heart of Virginia network hosted their second learning cohort with 12 individuals participating in an ABCD overview and 8 completing a community-based Power Shift Part 1 learning cohort.
Learn more about these and other partners on our partner page.
Learn more about our Fall Learning Cohorts in this video:
Coaching Activities:
During 2023, Embrace provided coaching to 20 ABCD practitioners working in over 20 different communities. These coaching services are provided to our training graduates on a sliding scale to ensure our services are accessible to all.
Here are just a few highlights from our coaching clients work this year:
Torrie Patterson of We Understand Youth launched her first action team, Teen Talks, in the spring of 2023 and successfully executed their first community initiative, a community-wide field day. This youth-led youth-development focused group completed their first formal listening project in the summer of 2023 conducting over 40 individual interviews with students from Prince Edward High School. Through this listening effort they discovered that roughly 50% of the youth had creative expression gifts (music, art and writing) that they were willing to invest in strengthening their school and community. Youth named student wellness, school culture and expanded vocational opportunities as projects they would be willing to take the lead on. This listening project served as the basis for recruitment of local partners to a second learning cohort and the emergence of a second creative expression based action team that will focus on strengthening school culture in 2024.
Bruce Wilson of Coastal Bend Neighborhood Empowerment continued to nurture relationships with the peer advocates from the Homeless Helping Homeless group in Corpus Christi, Texas. Bruce has supported this group of unhoused individuals, ensuring that their voices are being centered by institutional partners in a city-wide taskforce on homelessness.
Katie Gooch and her team at the Pace Center continued to deepen their ABCD efforts through their fellows program and were recognized for their efforts nationally as recipients of the Duke Divinity School Innovation Award. Every semester over 1,000 students benefit from this student-led community cultivation effort with 18 different connecting opportunities every week during the school year!
Centenary United Methodist church reopened their hot meals program and added an extra hour of hospitality allowing those experiencing food insecurity in downtown Richmond to cultivate a sense of community with their peers as they enjoy the companionship of the Centenary volunteers.
Some of our coaching clients took huge leaps forward in their ABCD efforts and others took small but thoughtful first steps. We are so thankful to be on the journey with these amazing community cultivators and we are excited to see where they go from here!
Connecting Opportunities:
Embrace hosts a variety of on-going groups that allow ABCD practitioners to access ongoing learning and peer support:
- The CommUnity Powered Network (launched in 2021) consists of Power Shift training graduates who are implementing ABCD across the United States.
- Regional Communities of Practice: Texas (2022), Heart of Virginia (2023), and Upper New York (2024)
- International groups sponsored by the ABCD Institute and co-facilitated by Embrace and partnering organizations include the Faith-Full ABCD Workgroup and Community of Practice and Rural ABCD Workgroup and Community of Practice, and the Story and Culture Workgroup and Communities of Practice.
- The Soul-Full Bridges Collective is hosted in partnership with Kaleidoscope Collaborative and is open to all community cultivators everywhere.
In 2023, our network weaving continued to expand and deepened with the launch of the ABCD Community Cultivator Network. This Mighty Network site has allowed us to bring together ABCD practitioners from our regional, national, and international groups into one shared online community. The ABCD Community Cultivator Network is open to anyone free of charge and serves as an entry point for those who are looking for a deeper connection to peers who are engaged in community cultivation work in a multitude of contexts. This site also serves as a host site for all of our self-paced and facilitated learning cohorts. You can join this site here.
2023 Great Neighbor Grant Award Winner!
Our 2023 Great Neighbor Grant award winner was Torrie Patterson with We Understand Youth, a 2022 Power Shift graduate from Farmville, Virginia. We Understand Youth received $2,000 in cash awards to support their Teen Talks Program and over $3,000 in training, coaching, facilitation, and consulting services to help them grow their program and impact.
In Summary
Embrace continues to equip community cultivators who are strengthening communities across the globe. We are so thankful for all these opportunities and look forward to making new friends and collaborating at an even deeper level with our partners in the new year.
Learn more about our training opportunities here.
Learn more about our coaching opportunities here.
To learn more about our connecting opportunities here.
If you would like to support Embrace, you can donate online here.