{"id":493,"date":"2012-08-21T05:05:57","date_gmt":"2012-08-21T05:05:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/?page_id=493"},"modified":"2012-08-22T03:57:37","modified_gmt":"2012-08-22T03:57:37","slug":"funding-proposal-to-expand-peer-support-for-climate-activists","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/?page_id=493","title":{"rendered":"Funding Proposal to Expand Tucson Pilot Project Nationally"},"content":{"rendered":"

Climate Corps: Peer Support to Reverse Global Warming<\/strong><\/p>\n

Contact<\/strong>: Jim Driscoll, Ph.D., M.B.A., Executive Director, National Institute for Peer Support, 4151 E. Boulder Springs Way, Tucson, AZ, USA, Phone: 520-250-0509,Email: JimDriscoll@NIPSPeerSupport.org<\/a>, Website: www.NIPSPeerSupport.org<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0Purpose: <\/strong>This Letter of Inquiry seeks tax-deductible funding for the National Institute for Peer Support (NIPS) to establish a \u201cClimate Corps,\u201d analogous to \u201cAmeriCorps,\u201d to expand its highly-successful, pilot project in Tucson and provide peer support to the broader climate-change movement. Funders can bring climate-peer-support to a new city for $5,000 with a residential, weekend workshop; $20,000 to staff Climate Corps locally; or $179,000 to fund four cities nationally.<\/p>\n

Problem<\/strong>: <\/strong>Global warming threatens our species! Fortunately, we know the steps to save ourselves. Indeed, a majority of people recognizes the danger, with about 25% \u201calarmed\u201d or \u201cconcerned.\u201d We just need to support more of the \u201cconcerned\u201d to become actively involved in the climate-change movement and keep them from burning out. We have done that in Tucson for the last year!<\/p>\n

Deliverables from the Tucson Climate Corps Pilot. <\/strong>The key regional climate-change organizer who had \u201cgiven up on Tucson\u201d, testifies that NIPS has increased climate change action here \u201cby a factor of three.\u201d NIPS has:<\/p>\n

*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Shaped public opinion<\/span> with two major events leading to major stories in the largely \u201cdenialist\u201d Tucson daily newspaper (attached), one on the front page, plus TV and radio coverage.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>*\u00a0 Expanded significantly the leadership infrastructure and local activist base<\/span>. Local climate leaders who had previously stopped working together now meet at least twice monthly and have reached out to new leaders, such as those in Occupy Tucson. We have tripled the number of climate activists taking part in training and actions.<\/p>\n

* Generated strategic initiatives<\/span>. Because of the bottoms-up nature of NIPS peer support and its freedom from specific, national programs, the existing local leadership and new recruits have identified new problems and tactics, including the need to stop the burning of coal in the local electrical-power plant on the heavily-Latino South Side and using nonviolent direct action as needed. We also spearheaded four events for 350.org, including bringing fifty climate activists to one of their initial weekend trainings, many of them new to the movement. We co-founded a local Citizens\u2019 Climate Lobby Chapter to fight for a national carbon fee and dividend program. We are toughening the Tucson Climate Plan. We also identified the need to eliminate racism in our local climate-change movement and scheduled a workshop on it.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

NIPS Model: <\/strong>To deliver these results, NIPS <\/strong>builds on the millions who meet daily in small, peer-support groups world-wide. NIPS benefitted from seven (7) years of funding from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and a successful six (6) year demonstration project, largely funded by the highly-selective Iraq-Afghanistan Deployment Impact Fund, organizing 2,500 Iraq-Afghanistan veterans (www.Vets4Vets.US<\/a>, evaluation attached.) From the peer-support world, NIPS has taken tools both to expand participation in the tasks of the movement and also to provide its signature emotional support: residential, weekend workshops (we have now organized 86); bottoms-up, information-sharing and problem-identification in \u201cTopic Group\u201d meetings, ongoing \u201cAction Groups\u201d (cf. affinity groups), ongoing \u201cSupport Groups\u201d and dyadic \u201cListening Turns,\u201d, classes and peer recruitment in one-on-ones, small and large group meetings. This broad participation, freed from any specific, national agenda, generates cutting-edge strategy and tactics. All this can be done by telephone or internet, although NIPS emphasizes face-to-face contact and relationship building.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Climate Corps Scholarships and Climate Support Centers. <\/strong>As always the question is how to compensate staff to spread an innovation? NIPS recognizes the dangers arising from the hiring of permanent, professionally- paid, centralized staffs\u2014including Harvard\u2019s Theda Skocpol\u2019s \u00a0recent analysis of U.S. social movements. Therefore, we will offer one temporary \u201cClimate Corps Scholarship\u201d in each city for only two years to focus on spreading peer support locally and, similar to the successful AmeriCorps program, pay only what we are calling the \u201cUniversal Climate Justice Stipend\u201d of $15,000. \u00a0This stipend approximates the world per-capita income and builds the transnational equality widely-cited as vital to a truly global movement. Each paid Scholar will rotate after no more than two years with other \u201cClimate Corps Volunteers,\u201d two or more whom he or she has recruited to live collectively in a house or apartment which will become the local \u201cClimate Corps Center.\u201d These recruited Volunteers will do paid \u201cbread labor\u201d working for cooperating, local, sustainability-oriented employers and voluntarily cap their income at the same Universal Climate Justice Stipend level of $15,000 for 30 hours. This leaves time for their volunteer work on climate change including peer support. The Climate Corps Centers where they all live will, besides enabling them to live more cheaply and sustainably, provide a focus for cutting-edge climate work in their communities, cutting across the specific agendas of national organizations\u2014and providing peer support to all local climate activists.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Next Steps<\/strong>. By the end of 2013, NIPS will hire a Climate Corps Scholar in Tucson to institutionalize this pilot project and three Scholars in additional communities in the United States, including one in Washington, DC. We will also hold up to seven residential weekend workshops in other communities as well. We will spread peer support through social-networking (blog, website, Facebook, TEDx, etc.) among activists, especially young adults. We are open to projects outside the U.S.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Staff<\/strong>. After earning a BA and an MBA from Harvard, a Ph.D. from Cornell and teaching for seven years at MIT\u2019s Sloan School of Management, Jim Driscoll, an angry, combat veteran of Vietnam, left the academy for a career in social change. Over the last thirty years, he has helped found and lead a number of local, state and national organizations, including key roles in the Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign, the large-scale, direct action (13,000 arrests) and subsequent electoral and lobbying efforts which stopped U.S. nuclear weapons testing in Nevada and establishing full public funding for all state elections in Arizona. In its first program for veterans, NIPS demonstrated the ability to hire and train staff to build local peer-support communities. Dr. Driscoll has raised $28 million for these progressive projects. In addition to Dr. Driscoll and four local staff (including the DC local project) , NIPS will hire an Administrator in DC where Dr. Driscoll is moving to support his wife in helping raise two grand-babies.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Four-City, Phase-Two, One-Year Budget <\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Staff and benefits (6 at $16,500 ea.)\u00a0 Executive and Administrator (2)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 $33,000<\/p>\n

Local Climate Support Scholars (4)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0$66,000<\/p>\n

Operations, including travel\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0$30,000<\/p>\n

Workshops (10 at$5,000 ea.)\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0$50,000<\/p>\n

Total<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 $179,000<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Climate Corps: Peer Support to Reverse Global Warming Contact: Jim Driscoll, Ph.D., M.B.A., Executive Director, National Institute for Peer Support, 4151 E. Boulder Springs Way, Tucson, AZ, USA, Phone: 520-250-0509,Email: JimDriscoll@NIPSPeerSupport.org, Website: www.NIPSPeerSupport.org \u00a0Purpose: This Letter of Inquiry seeks tax-deductible funding for the National Institute for Peer Support (NIPS) to establish a \u201cClimate Corps,\u201d analogous … <\/p>\n

Read more “Funding Proposal to Expand Tucson Pilot Project Nationally”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-493","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/493","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=493"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/493\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":511,"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/493\/revisions\/511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nipspeersupport.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=493"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}