Community Engagement Coordinator (@ Common Agency)

Community Engagement Coordinator at Common Agency in Kenosha, WI, Racine, WI or Milwaukee, WI - shared by Jobs That Help as a third party

(please note: confirm estimated start and end dates for this opportunity with Common Agency)

Job Type Details: Part-time, 6-month contract role, flexible 5-10 hours/week, possible renewal

Community Engagement Coordinator for Kenosha, Racine, and Milwaukee Counties

Imagine: you wake up in the morning and walk your kids to your neighbor Rhonda’s house, with some frozen tamales you made for her. Rhonda is taking them with her grandkids to the nature center, while you head to work. When you get there, you see another neighbor Francesca dropping off her kids too, and she can’t wait to share a fun fact she learned about your town in the chosen title for your local authors book club meet-up later that week. As you pass by an alley, you text your neighbor Rodrigo a picture of kids playing on the street mural you painted together, and he suggests an idea for taking the kids caroling at the local seniors home. 

You are so proud to be building the neighborhood for your kids that you wish you had when growing up and so grateful this is the neighborhood you’ll have when growing old.

Common Agency exists to help neighborhoods like this become reality! 

We do this in three ways: 

(1) We build an online neighborhood network (like social media but with a focus on getting off the screen) called Stone Soup App that helps neighbors who share interests and ideas find each other. 

(2) We set up Stone Soup Funds, where neighbors decide how to allocate money to make the neighborhood better in some way. Maybe it’s transforming an abandoned building into a community center, getting hot dogs for the block party, or setting up a tool library. We help neighborhoods figure out how to make these decisions and take actions.

(3) We coach Stone Soup Stewards, a rotating group of intergenerational neighbors who lead the direction of Stone Soup App and Stone Soup Funds by inviting their neighbors to participate more.

We’re a distributed team based in Michigan, Iowa, and Washington. We’re now looking for someone based in southeast Wisconsin and passionate about connecting neighbors to build belonging and power together, to help us deepen our work in Kenosha, Racine, and Milwaukee Counties.

The Community Engagement Coordinator’s primary role is to be the on-the-ground lead for Common Agency’s pilots in 3 neighborhoods in Kenosha, Racine, and Milwaukee Counties as part of our work with Uniting to Prevent Targeted Violence in Southeast Wisconsin. To test our model, we aim to have 100 engaged people in each neighborhood. That means the goal is to have 100 folks in each neighborhood using our Stone Soup App and at least one Stone Soup Fund set up. If you join our team, your job is to help us get there. How?

1. Invite neighbors to participate through: 

• First understanding the neighborhood and meeting neighbors where they’re at and documenting their stories and hopes for their neighborhood
• Building mutually beneficial partnerships with trusted local institutions
• Hosting demonstrations of Stone Soup App at local events
• Scheduling drop-ins and one-on-ones for people experiencing technical challenges with Stone Soup App (think Apple Genius Bar)
• Organizing unmissable, high-turnout events that inform and demonstrate what we’re about, with outreach like door knocking, flyering, tabling, and posting to local social media

2. Convene and coordinate Stone Soup Stewards, local leaders whom we coach to get their neighbors more involved with shaping their community. This will involve:

• Meeting with each Stewards’ group 1-2x a month to set goals, check on progress, exchange feedback, and brainstorm solutions to challenges
• Equipping Stewards to catalyze sign-ups and engagement with Stone Soup App
• Offering hands-on support for Stewards, as needed

3. Document neighborhood transformation by: 

• Interviewing individual residents about how their lives have changed by participating in Common Agency offerings
• Writing stories or creating videos / media to show changes in individual resident’s lives or in the neighborhood as a whole

This is a part-time contract role that we believe is an amazing opportunity for the right person. We think that person will likely have these characteristics:

• Storyteller. You are good at finding and making meaning from data to weave together narratives via research, interviews, focus groups, etc. You’re multi-modal: writing, photographing, drawing, diagrams, etc.
• Experienced and admired event host/facilitator. You like getting creative with your gatherings in all stages – inviting, preparing, hosting, documenting, and following up. People (both adults and children!) never want to miss your events.
• Reliable team player and leader. You enjoy collaborating with others to make and commit to plans and follow ups. You know your weakness and strengths and communicate openly when you need support and experience success!
• Open to trying new things. You’re excited to experiment with new ideas, and you can design quick ways to test bigger processes. You like to ask questions and receive feedback to iterate until you find the right fit.
• Curious about people and their gifts. You love going to community events and can strike up conversations with any neighbor. You love discovering what people love, what they dream about, and what they’re skilled at.
• Connect people across differences. You’ve navigated difficult conversations and conflicts before. You see disagreements as a way to better understand other perspectives and embrace the phrase ‘arguing to agree.’
• Hopeful about the potential of neighborhood. You believe neighborhoods are an under-leveraged unit of change. You’ve been part of groups of neighbors coming together to solve something meaningful in your neighborhood.

This role’s compensation is $20-30/hour, depending on experience. We expect this contract role will take 5-10 hours per week for 6 months, with possibility of renewal.