Inclusive Global Leadership Initiative's Summer Institute

Engagement Initiatives

The Inclusive Global Leadership Initiative's annual Summer Institute brings women-identified activists working on the frontlines to promote peace, justice, and human rights around the world to Colorado to receive advanced training in waging successful nonviolent movements for social change. The Institute is designed to strengthen their role as leaders in movements by offering women activists evidence-based training, networking opportunities, and a space to exchange stories about their particular struggles and successes. The IGLI Summer Institute receives support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the Arca Foundation, the Compton Foundation, the Jewish Women's Fund of Colorado, the Social Sciences Foundation of the University of Denver, and local philanthropists.

The Institute is one component of the larger Inclusive Global Leadership Initiative (IGLI) that initiates research, education, and programming aimed at elevating and amplifying the work that women and marginalized communities do to lead movements for social change around the world.

IGLI is directed by Professor Marie Berry, and was co-founded with Erica Chenoweth (Harvard Kennedy School).

2019 IGLI Summer Institute

Want to learn more about 2019's summer institute and what was experienced? 

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The 2019 IGLI Summer Institute took place from August 24-30, 2019, in both Colorado and Washington D.C. This year's institute was co-partnered with the United States Insitute of Peace (USIP). 

2018 IGLI Summer Institute

The 2018 IGLI Summer Institute took place from August 26-29, 2018 at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies, University of Denver. The 2018 Summer Institute convened 14 women activists from 13 countries who are leading movements to promote peace, security, justice, and human rights. Over the course of the three-day workshop, these activists had opportunities to interact, to share stories about their particular struggles and successes, and to receive advanced training from some of the world's leading experts on waging effective nonviolent civil resistance campaigns.

The 2018 IGLI Summer Institute was the second in an annual tradition of bringing frontline, women-identified activists to the University of Denver to receive education, training, and networking opportunities designed to strengthen their role as leaders in movements for progressive social change. The Institute featured facilitated exercises, participant-led discussions, and lectures on topics such as developing effective movement strategies, inclusive approaches to sustained coalition-building and harnessing technology for social change. It also provided opportunities for the participants to communicate the types of research that would be most useful for their campaigns.

Read the 2018 IGLI Annual Report Here

 

What Participants Said About the 2018 IGLI Summer Institute

"Sie Center's 'IGLI' is the groundbreaking world-class training of the ages...my life is forever changed, my spirit is made stronger and even more determined now with the tools and selflessness. Thank you."

"It's so powerful to hear women's stories of courage, transformation, mobilizing and effecting change whether from a personal level to the societal/institutional level. It is also very good to hear of other struggles and to gain perspective on the challenges so many [women], especially in very authoritative and repressive societies."

"I really liked the takeaway message about the meaning of organizing and building leadership. It was helpful to think how leadership is cultivated, developing [different] types of leaders and thinking about how to build an organization structure and systems as an effective campaign."

2018 IGLI Summer Institute Public Events

Denver Dialogues Keynote with Traci Blackmon


The Power of Strategic Storytelling with Just Vision's Suhad Babaa

2017 IGLI Summer Institute

The inaugural IGLI Summer Institute in 2017 brought together 15 activists from 14 countries—including India, Cameroon, Indonesia, Colombia, and the U.S.—to exchange and learn from each other and eight faculty members, including some of the world's foremost experts on civil resistance. Keynotes talks from Carmen Perez, Co-Chair of the Women's March on Washington, Jeanette Vizguerra, an undocumented activist and organizer, and Suhad Babaa, Executive Director of Just Vision, expanded the community built during the Institute even further. At the end of the Institute, participants were invited to attend a restorative retreat in the Rocky Mountains.

 

What Participants Said About 2017 IGLI Summer Institute

"Thank you so much for the opportunity to be vulnerable, to be human and allowed to be cared for. Your expertise is invaluable. Your work will have lasting and replicating effects." 
–Immigrant rights activist from the U.S.

"This is a great experience that every woman leader should have access to."
–Gender, youth, and migrant rights activist from Kenya

"The Summer Institute is a program that feeds the needs of activists. It increased our theoretical and practical knowledge on civil resistance and also allowed us to learn the experiences and lessons of other participants."
–Gender and peacebuilding activist from Colombia