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2024 Summit
Thanks for a great Summit!
| TOPIC | DESCRIPTION / SPEAKERS | VIDEO | SLIDES | ADDITIONAL MATERIALS |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Special Address | Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs | Video | ||
| State of Sister District | Lala Wu, Executive Director | Video | Slides | |
| 2024 Strategy | Gaby Goldstein, SVP | Video | Slides | |
| Youth Panel | -Oliver Shirley, Law Student, Columbia Law School, President, Columbia Law School Democrats, Northeast Regional Director of Law School Democrats of America -Yana Batra, Campus Mobilization Director, Georgia Youth Justice Coalition -Aiden Ledbetter, President, Davis College Democrats | Video | ||
| 2023 Impact | -Shawn Werner, Organizing and Political Director -Raven Douglas, Head of Civic Engagement Programs | Video | Slides | |
| Organizing Workshops: Donor Organizing (part 1&2) | Haley Bash, Founder and Executive Director of Donor Organizer Hub | Video | Slides | Notes from session, Donor Reflection Prompts,Making the asks, Empathy Maps, Donor Recruitment Retention Idea Generation |
| Organizing Workshops: Surviving, Thriving, and Winning in 2024 | Leader Panelists: Jordan Hiller, SD Portland+, Maureen Sheehan, SD South Bay, Laura Durkin, SD Greater Chicago | Video | Notes from session | |
| Organizing Workshops: Digital Organizing in a Presidential Year | Panelists: Carla Marin, Senior Digital Strategist at Middle Seat Digital, Lyzz Schwegler, Co-Founder, Senior Vice President of Digital, Tifrah Akhtar, Senior Social Media & Digital Manager | Video | Notes from session | |
| Featured Fireside Chat | Wisconsin Former Lt. Governor Mandela Barnes in conversation with Lala Wu | Video | ||
| Closed Captioning for Main Room |
Donor Organizing: Recruiting New Donors
Join Donor Organizing Hub’s Executive Director, Haley Bash, for part one of a two part workshop exploring how to recruit new donors into your network and retain and grow their capacity once in the door. Part one will focus on frameworks and practices to recruit new donors and maximize your fundraising efforts in 2024.
Surviving, Thriving, and Winning in 2024
Feeling anxious about 2024? Election cycles can take a lot out of us as activists. Join Sister District staff and volunteer leaders for a conversation on how to confront the uncertainty of this crucial and life changing election year with optimism and resilience AND how to get your friends involved while doing it!
Donor Organizing: Retaining and Escalating Existing Donors
In part two of our Donor Organizing workshop, we’ll dive into how we can move donors up the Donor Engagement Ladder, how to structure your fundraising plans and activities to maximize donor engagement, setting and tracking goals, and the do’s and don’ts of escalating donors to reach their full potential.
Digital Organizing in a Presidential Year
What messages actually resonate with volunteers and how can we deliver them effectively? Join Sister District Co-Founder and Senior Vice President of Digital, Lyzz Schwegler, Sister District’s Senior Digital & Content Manager, Tifrah Akhtar, and Lead Digital Strategist from Sister District’s digital firm Middle Seat, Carla Marin, for a conversation about how to reach and activate volunteers in and outside your network through digital tactics and what messages will cut through the noise in a busy presidential cycle.
We are thrilled to announce that Governor Katie Hobbs will kick off the Summit on March 9th. She will speak to the current lay of the land in one of the most hotly contested in the 2024 election cycle. With a contested presidential, a competitive US Senate race, and several congressional races and the opportunity to flip both legislative chambers, Arizona will be ground-zero for Democrats this fall.
Governor Hobbs was elected as the 24th Governor of Arizona in 2022. Her tenure has been marked by progress in increasing funding in public education, advocating for abortion access, and ensuring that Arizona has the water resources necessary to continue to grow. Her veto pen has prevented the election conspiracists from implementing extreme election reforms and from enacting a far-right social agenda.
Prior to her gubernatorial election, she served as Arizona’s Secretary of State from 2019-2023, where she oversaw the state’s secure and safe elections. She is no stranger to building progressive power in the states. As Democratic Leader of the Arizona State Senate in 2014, she co-founded the Arizona Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, the only organization in Arizona dedicated to winning seats in the Arizona legislature. When she founded the organization, Democrats were in a deep minority and through the last decade, Democrats have built power and are on the precipice of control.
Mandela’s story is a Wisconsin story. Throughout his career working for Wisconsin’s working people, Mandela served in the Wisconsin legislature, became Wisconsin’s first Black Lt. Governor and the state’s second-ever Black statewide elected official, and ran a record-breaking campaign for the U.S. Senate. As Lt. Governor, Mandela worked closely with Governor Evers to help Wisconsin recover from the pandemic and served as the chair of the Governor’s Task Force on Climate Change. In his historic U.S. Senate campaign, he broke state fundraising records and came one point away from unseating a two-term incumbent in Wisconsin’s closest Senate election in 100 years. Despite being massively outspend and written off by nearly every pundit, Mandela came within 26,000 votes of defeating an entrenched incumbent. Determined to support other diverse and groundbreaking candidates in their runs for office across the country, Mandela founded the Long Run PAC in 2022 to make sure when candidates are asked time and time again, as he was, “can you win?” they can answer “yes!” In addition to his work with the Long Run PAC, Mandela is also the President of Power to the Polls, an organization dedicated to empowering underserved voters in Wisconsin.
Mandela Barnes was the 45th Lt. Governor Wisconsin – the state’s second-ever Black statewide elected official and first-ever Black Lt. Governor. He started his career as an organizer, served in the Wisconsin legislature, and ran a record-breaking U.S. Senate campaign, where he came one point away from unseating a two-term incumbent in Wisconsin’s closest Senate election in 100 years. As Lt. Governor, Mandela worked closely with Governor Evers to help Wisconsin recover from the pandemic and served as the chair of the Governor’s Task Force on Climate Change. Determined to support other diverse and groundbreaking candidates across the country, Mandela founded the Long Run PAC. He also has returned to his organizing roots as President of Power to the Polls WI, an organization dedicated to empowering underserved voters in Wisconsin.
Lead Digital Strategist at Middle Seat
Carla has experience leading digital programs for statewide campaigns and national organizations. Carla has worked with several clients such as Sister District Project, 350.org, MoveOn, Squad Victory Fund, and Ayanna Pressley for Congress.Before joining Middle Seat in 2021, she served as the Digital Director for the North Carolina Democratic Party and Digital Director for Governor Roy Cooper’s re-election campaign. Carla graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Go Heels!
Founder and Executive Director of Donor Organizer Hub
Haley Bash (they/she) is a grassroots fundraiser, distributed organizer, and facilitator with 10+ years of experience in the social movement sector. They are Founder and Executive Director of Donor Organizer Hub, a launchpad and community for people who fundraise for movement causes from their networks.
Law Student, Columbia Law School,President, Columbia Law School Democrats, Northeast Regional Director of Law School Democrats of America.
Oliver has volunteered with Sister District since 2017 and was an Organizing Fellow and GOTV Fellow in 2021. He is currently in law school at Columbia University, where he is the President of the Columbia Law School Democrats, Northeast Regional Director of Law School Democrats of America, and an occasional Sister District phonebank host.
Campus Mobilization Director, Georgia Youth Justice Coalition
Yana is a community organizer, strategist, and leader of youth movements in Georgia. As co-founder of the Georgia Youth Justice Coalition, she spent the last three years working to get young people a seat at the table by building a vibrant community of youth changemakers across the state. She currently serves as Campus Mobilization Director, leading a team activating college students across 18 college campuses in Georgia. Yana is a first generation Indian American living in Atlanta and pursuing a mechanical engineering degree from Georgia Tech.
President, Davis College Democrats
Aiden is a third year undergraduate student at UC Davis pursuing a double major in Political Science and Psychology. He currently serves as the President of the Davis College Democrats, the official arm of the democratic party at UC Davis. He works extensively to organize students and get them engaged in the political process locally and beyond!
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