To be announced
Apply Today - Deadline April 10
Potential participants should fill out an application form. Because space is limited, we will contact you shortly after the application deadline to schedule an interview or confirm your enrollment.
Apply now for Neighborhoods Now!
Neighborhoods Now! Program Calendar
The course is May 6 - May 10, 2024 10:00am to 4:00pm each day conducted in person at a location to be announced later. The course will also have select guest speakers from the field. Two follow-up Think Tanks and graduation will be in-person.
Neighborhoods Now! is an innovative community educational series to strengthen the work of individuals and organizations working in neighborhoods to:
- Organize to win issues for people and places.
- Build power to change systems for racial equity and economic justice.
- Build organizations whose leadership is reflective of the community.
- Build diverse and effective cross cultural collaborations.
Who is this for?
We welcome participants who have a passion and interest in learning and practicing neighborhood organizing skills including neighborhood and community organization staff, board and volunteers, as well as neighborhood residents who are not formally connected to an organization. We welcome people at a variety of skill levels, from people who are just getting started to experienced organizers and leaders looking to refresh or gain new skills. For each class we aim to recruit a culturally and geographically diverse group of participants.
How it works
Neighborhoods Now! offers five different classes that are each a day long. Course participants are expected to attend all five of the day-long classes, with follow-up Think Tank sessions with your fellow cohort organizers, guest speakers, and a graduation. During the entirety of the course and your new connection to CURA’s Neighborhood Organizing and Leadership Program, participants will have access to 1-to-1 support from CURA staff.
Ned Wik Moore
Ned Wik Moore has over 20 years of leadership and organizing experience for racial, social, and economic justice. He graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2002 with a bachelor's degree in Political Science and Global Studies. In college, he studied liberation theology, social movements, and sustainable development in Cuba, Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragaua. During and after college, he also participated in numerous human rights and international solidarity initiatives including serving as a student delegate, human rights and elections observer in Cuba, El Salvador and Colombia.
Ned worked for 7 years to build power in manufactured home neighborhoods in the Twin Cities suburbs and in Greater Minnesota, as a Community Organizer and Organizing Director at All Parks Alliance for Change (APAC). During that time he organized two dozen resident associations across the state to fight against displacement and parklord abuse which led to dozens local ordinances, successful lawsuits to expand and protect residents rights, improved living conditions, affordable housing preservation and cooperative ownership.
From 2009-2011 he was the Campus Minister for Social Justice at St. Catherine University where he led Justice Immersion Trips with students to El Paso and Denver exploring issues of immigration and homelessnes while exploring the connections between faith, social justice and leadership. He also supported and mentored students organizing in response to US militarism and human rights abuses in Latin America, food justice, 2010 Census, racial justice concerns on campus, and connections to critical community-led initiatives off campus.
For over a decade, Ned assumed various leadership roles in faith-based organizing to advance a relentless struggle demanding a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, training hundreds of community leaders, registering Latinx voters, and organizing countless direct actions in Congressional offices in Minnesota, Washington, D.C. and across the country, also conducting raid response and know your rights trainings, and offering direct support to families at risk of deportation.
Ned’s CURA involvement began in 2004 when he graduated from the Twin Cities Training Program for Neighborhood Organizers, later serving as an Advisory Committee member for CURA’s Minnesota Center for Neighborhood Organizing in 2007. He joined CURA staff in 2011, leading initiatives promoting racial equity and community organizing in response to the proposed build out of the regional light rail transit system in partnership with The Alliance and Nexus Community Partners. In partnership with The Alliance, CURA also supported the founding of Equity in Place, a regional wide coalition and diverse group of strategic partners from organizations led by people of color and housing advocacy organizations.
In 2015, Ned and colleague Malik Holt-Shabazz launched Neighborhoods Now! to support and develop neighborhood organizers and leaders in place-based organizing through a racial equity lens. To date, the program has seen nearly 300 graduates, and Ned has continued to coach, support and mentor dozens of program alumni.
Ned lives in Minneapolis, is a parent and spouse, and writes music.
Related programs
Ishmail Malik Holt-Shabazz
Prior to joining the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities’ Center for Urban and Regional Affairs and its Neighborhood Leadership and Organizing Program as its now Co-Director, Ishmail Malik started as a Union Organizer for the AFL-CIO Wisconsin Statewide and with Minneapolis Bicycle Coalition to promote access, equity, and community benefits of bicycle infrastructure, policy, and engagement.
He also served as the Executive Director and Economic Development Organizer of North Minneapolis’s Harrison Neighborhood Association for 11 years and three years as the City of Saint Paul’s Director of District 6 Planning Council leading in both organizations community engagement projects, racial equitable development initiatives, business development, community benefits agreements, equitable development scorecard strategies, and land use planning. He also served as statewide supervisor for AmeriCorps in the early 2000s.
Also, as of June 10th, 2022, Malik is a registered civil mediator through the Conflict Resolution Center of Minnesota. He received an undergraduate degree in Liberal Arts in Human Services with a minor in Sociology from the University of Minnesota Morris. Malik currently sits on the Board of Directors for Twin Cities’ Men’s Center and the Alliance for Metropolitan Stability. He is a former long-standing member on multiple grant review committees; multiple Minneapolis neighborhood association and Saint Paul district council volunteer boards as an officer plus in committee positions; is a 2004 graduate of Neighborhood Leadership and Organizing's Neighborhood Organizing Training Program, and is a past member of the Neighborhood Leadership and Organizing Advisory Committee. He is also a former Emergency Services Director for American Red Cross, Northwest Illinois-Rockford chapter.
Malik is a native of Chicago but has lived in Minnesota for over 28 years. His life has centered on family, spirituality, music, dance, and his love for learning, community capacity building, systems change, reparative racial justice, equitable economic development with local community benefits, and direct service. I'm honored.
