Hello Colleagues,
We are at a threshold for building this newly forming community and we’d like to call those interested in to help us with these next crucial steps. We had 53 people respond to our survey–thank you! (Fill out Survey here) Two priorities that stand out are a desire for community connection and professional skill development. Hearing this, we are first looking to do the following and you can help:
Gather a committee that will collaborate with local SEP’s, as well as the occasional outside professional, to create a webinar series on Somatic Experiencing skill development. Our hope is to offer a presentation at least every two months to start. The presenters will be paid through the funding from the Marc Schuler Legacy Fund. Committee members’ time commitment would be approx 2 - 5 hrs a week depending on the size of the committee.
Gather a committee to select new Board members. The Board is currently all-white, and we actively seek greater diversity in the future composition of board members. We are looking for additional advisory board members at this time. We anticipate that committee members will need to commit 2-5 hours a week until Board elections occur.
We are in need of a Social Media Content Creator. Someone to write and deliver ongoing social media announcements and current topics to our members
We want to acknowledge the current patriarchal practice to have people work without pay. We hold the intention to have future fundraising to change this practice. We would like to extend the offer that anyone serving the Association at this time, will be given a NorCal SEPA membership without cost while they serve.
A requirement of any of these leadership roles is an ability to self-regulate with the intention of repair and forward thinking. There will be an expectation that Leaders will be doing their own inquiry for breaking down structural racism (with the future intention that SEPA will provide ongoing outside support). In our weekly meetings, the current board continues to bring unconscious topics to the forefront as they arise. The topics are discussed and integrated into our goals and actions. We use SE principles to guide our relational communications as well.
The current SEPA board believes that representation matters. We recognize that listening to diverse voices challenging SEI to be more aware and inclusive is necessary, especially given the complex history of wounding our community has experienced. We want NorCal SEPA to be an organizational structure that can continually grow and model decision-making processes that are humble yet courageous, and that build capacity. We want to support the constructive changes we see within SEI and to start building spaces for healing and inclusion for our current community in Northern California and the future participants who will go through this program.
We look forward to hearing back from you! Here are the ways you can express interest:
Click this link to express interest in any of the above (Interest Form)
Expressing interest will also add you to our opt-in email list for future updates.
OR:
Please email info@norcalsepa.com (Andrea Gage currently monitors that account). Should you not hear any acknowledgement of your email within a week, please ping us again or email Andrea at andrea@easethebody.com.
Please go to norcalsepa.com for information and opt-in to our email list.
We have had several Community Connect calls that have been nourishing and fun!
With Appreciation,
The Current SEPA Board members
Maureen Harrington
Mike Changaris
Andrea Gage
Gwynne Gilson