Advocacy is the process of identifying with and representing a person’s views and concerns, in order to secure enhanced rights and entitlements, undertaken by someone who has little or no conflict of interest
Courses Offered:
SHEP have been involved in Advocacy Training for more than twenty years. Currently, our focus is on two training courses, as follows:
- SHEP Certificate in Introduction to Advocacy (planned for September 2024. To register your interest, please contact marge.lysaght@socialandhealth.com)
Details of the introduction to Advocacy Course can be found here -Â https://socialandhealth.com/training/introduction-to-advocacy-training/
- SHEP Certified Self-Advocacy Course: Developing Our Skills to Speak Up and Speak Out (starting October 17th 2023; closing date for applications is September 18th 2023)
Are you interested in learning about what self-advocacy involves? Are you thinking about how you might be able to develop your own skills to self- advocate for access to your rights and entitlements? Do you want to develop your abilities to speak up for yourself? If yes is the answer to these questions, then this part-time SHEP course, starting in October 2023, may be of interest to you.
About the ‘Self-Advocacy: Developing Our Skills to Speak Up and Speak Out’ course.
There may be times in our lives when we need to speak up for ourselves. Situations might arise in our personal or working lives, in relation to the conditions of our housing, finances or health. Sometimes we may need to speak up for ourselves on our own, with support or maybe as a group. This Self-Advocacy course aims to offer a space to share our experiences, to learn from each other and to enhance our capacity to self-advocate.
This open-access Social and Health Education Project (SHEP) course is an introduction to self-advocacy and is a SHEP certified course. It will be of interest to a wide variety of people who want to improve their skills to speak out on issues affecting their lives. What makes this programme unique is that it has been developed in the context of the SHEP Advocacy Programme, which provides direct advocacy services to adults with disabilities living in the community and in disability service settings. This means that the programme has the benefit of direct experience in providing support to people to build self-advocacy skills, as well as being informed by the day-to-day realities of advocacy practice in the landscape of rights and entitlements for people with disabilities. Therefore, while skills learned are applicable in a variety of settings, there will be an emphasis on self-advocacy in relation to disabilities.
The course will be facilitated by experienced advocacy practitioners and trainers. It will be delivered over 7 weeks. It involves 8 training sessions: 6 ‘in person’ x 2.5hour sessions held on Tuesday evenings, and 2 x 7 hour sessions held on 2 Saturdays.
Please note that this course does not focus on representative advocacy.
Course Aim
The aim of the course is to provide participants with an opportunity to develop their self-advocacy skills, with an emphasis on experiential learning, so that they can apply this learning to issues, and in settings, in their own lives. Participants who successfully complete this course will acquire knowledge, skills and understanding which will help them to develop skills for self-advocacy.
Philosophy
This course is underpinned by SHEP’s philosophy that self-awareness and self-knowledge, when combined with a commitment to community action, is the basis for personal and social transformation. The course is inspired by SHEP’s commitment to equality, social justice, social transformation, and the contribution that group spaces can create for learning. The course reflects SHEP’s philosophy that adults continue to learn throughout their life and that life and practice experience is an invaluable source for that learning.
For more information please contact the course co-ordinator on marge.lysaght@socialandhealth.com or call 021 4666180
To view Course Flyer, click here:https://socialandhealth.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Publicity-2023-self-advocacy-course-flyer-.jpg
To view the Course Brochure, click here: https://socialandhealth.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Developing-Our-Skills-to-Speak-Up-and-Speak-Out-2023-Course-Brochure.pdf
To request a course application form, please contact marge.lysaght@soicalandhealth.com, info@soicalandhealth.com or call 021 4666180.