Trainings: Leadership Empowerment Action Project (LEAP)

LEAP is a training model that facilitates the development of leadership and community organizing skills for child care teachers and family child care providers.

First developed by CCW in 1994, LEAP training helps teachers and providers work more effectively for improvements in compensation and working conditions, in order to provide the best possible care and education for children. The training is built on participants’ own personal and professional experiences, using an interactive style that includes storytelling, discussions, demonstrations and debates. LEAP examines the social, political and economic dimensions of child care employment, providing knowledge and skills that can lead to policy analysis, direct action and community organizing. Participants leave the training with strategies for action for their own workplaces and/or communities.

Topics covered in LEAP training include:

• Sharing of Child Care Work Experiences
• How Society Views Child Care Work
• Creating a Vision of Good Child Care Jobs
• Criteria for Supportive Work Environments
• The Economics of Child Care
• Developing and Analyzing Initiatives to Improve Child Care Jobs
• Effective Grassroots Leadership
• Types of Community Organizing

For more information about LEAP training, contact Gretchen Ames at Child Care Resource Center, 617-547-1063 x 236 or by email at massleap@ccrcinc.org.