Internal training and external training
Training is a central element of Arcigay's organizational development, but also of its ability to engage with and interact with reality. Arcigay recently chose to invest in an increasingly structured training system as a first step toward transforming part of the association's activities into a fully-fledged National Training Agency on LGBTI issues, starting with the creation of an Internal Register of Trainers.
To structure and systematize the internal training, in 2016 the INTEGRATED SYSTEMIC CONTINUOUS TRAINING PROGRAM (FISC) for Arcigay activists. This program aims to create a stable and self-sufficient network of trainers who, from the central level, bring action and knowledge to the committees' local areas. Generally, the program uses traditional methods, but also includes non-formal education on the self, the group, the network, and communication, including multimedia, through targeted interventions aimed at developing knowledge of new software applications for more effective forms of communication. Through self-empowerment and group training, participants critically and consciously explore their relational and communicative skills within the context of activism, potentialities, and operational peculiarities that can then be implemented in the committees' activities.
Arcigay has also proposed and is proposing external training, or towards public or private entities (companies, private social organizations, etc.), upon request or as part of specific projects.
A long experience in the training field
Since its foundation, Arcigay has promoted training activities for activists; a fundamental commitment today, but even more so in historical and political moments in which there was a total lack of information on the issues of sexual-emotional identity, the fight against discrimination due to sexual orientation and behavior and gender identity. Projects such as "E-cademy" (2009), "People have the Power" (2013), "We Young People Protagonists of a Conscious Sexuality" (2014), have made it possible to Spread fundamental knowledge about the world of LGBTI activism to thousands of activists across the country and have contributed to creating that network of people and experiences that today is the human and relational structure on which the reasons for our being "together" are based. Over the years, Through the funds of Law 383 of 2000 dedicated to social promotion associations, 11 training and information projects were carried out, involving thousands of volunteers. The maturity achieved by the LGBTI movement, in terms of political awareness and the structuring of services offered to the community, today calls for increasingly specific and targeted training and information initiatives, with a systemic approach. This not only provides cultural tools for understanding a complex context, but also helps us better carry out the advocacy and service activities in which our Association is engaged.
The conceptual and political framework within which training initiatives are framed takes into account three fundamental and synchronous variables: the person, the network, and the system. Arcigay focuses on training both the individual and the community, implementing and circulating information and knowledge, and developing methods of empowerment. The results of the training activities of the past few years are very encouraging and have brought significantly effective and shared content and methods to the movement, both in the lives of activists and in the creation of a network between circles and individuals.
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