Are you a local community leader interested in building a more inclusive and equitable city for everyone? Social Planning Toronto (SPT) is a nonprofit, charitable community-based organization that challenges inequity in our city to spark social and policy change. SPT is inviting interested residents of Toronto to join a new Civic Leaders team to support its outreach, advocacy and mobilization work. SPT Civic Leaders will participate in SPT-led training, outreach, policy action, and advocacy initiatives (including voter and election engagement, poverty reduction, improving affordability, public service improvement, and community wealth building) that will build a more equitable city.
SPT is recruiting eight Civic Leaders from across Toronto and will support them in strengthening their skills, knowledge, and opportunities to network in order to create a foundation for local organizing and movement building. The leaders will take part in joint actions for change, get hands-on experience in advocacy, and learn best practices in community engagement from experts and each other.
The pilot project will run for one year, with the possibility for extension. The time commitment will be up to 40 hours annually. Participation is expected to take place both in person and online.
Interested leaders are encouraged to apply by filling out the attached Google form. SPT will prioritize applicants from equity-deserving groups, people with barriers to participation and access, and residents who are committed to equity and social justice. The selected Civic Leaders will be compensated for their community engagement work with an honorarium. The application deadline is Friday, March 28, 2025 at 5 p.m. For more information, please contact Israt at [email protected].
What is the SPT Civic Leaders Team?
The Civic Leaders will work with SPT to engage with and mobilize community members to participate in and inform SPT-led initiatives. SPT encourages resident leaders who are interested in systems change and advocacy in their communities to apply for this role. The ideal candidates live in the City of Toronto (including North York, York, Etobicoke, East York, and Scarborough) and have knowledge of Toronto’s neighbourhoods and its diverse populations.
The Civic Leaders will learn about the public policy change process, government actors and functions, change leadership, the knowledge building process, and community building.
The ideal candidates will have experience (or interest in learning) the following skills:
- Public engagement (i.e. community planning and organizing, outreach, event management and promotion,social media);
- Facilitation (i.e. leading or assisting meetings and public forums);
- Public speaking (i.e. articulating thoughts or ideas for an audience);
- Advocacy and community organizing (i.e. planning and participating in actions for change);
- Understanding policy (i.e. processing public policy in user-friendly terms);
- Knowledge mobilization (i.e. translating policy into accessible language and formats);
The ideal candidates are expected to have some knowledge of the following areas:
- City government and decision making processes;
- Issues that impact Toronto’s equity-deserving communities;
- Civic engagement;
- Equity and diversity principles;
- Anti-oppression and intersectionality;
- Lived expertise and respect for lived expertise.
Successful candidates will engage fellow residents in understanding and advocating for policy solutions to influence change. SPT will require successful candidates to attend mandatory and additional training for this role.
SPT offers living wage honoraria to successful candidates for assigned duties. All interested residents are encouraged to apply for this role via Google form by March 28 at 5 p.m. Please contact Israt at [email protected] for more information.
SPT thanks all candidates for their interest. Please note that only candidates selected for an interview will be contacted.