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Step 2: Get Organized

This section provides the nuts and bolts for forming and starting your advocacy group. You’ll find suggestions for running meetings, an example meeting agenda, and ongoing conversation topics here.

The School Food Advocacy Toolkit covers: Get Educated, Get Organized (current page), Get Support, Take Action.

Step 2: Get Organized

This section provides the nuts and bolts for forming and starting your advocacy group. You’ll find suggestions for running meetings, an example meeting agenda, and ongoing conversation topics here.

The School Food Advocacy Toolkit covers: Get Educated, Get Organized (current page), Get Support, Take Action.

Members of an Advocacy Group

An advocacy group is an organized body that includes members from different segments of the community. The most influential advocacy groups are often composed of a variety of different types of stakeholders with varied backgrounds, skills, and competencies. When forming your advocacy group, it’s important to consider the different types of school community stakeholders that you’d like to have represented so you can generate equitable ideas and input that can transform your community.

When you think about your school community and the types of stakeholders that may have a vested interest in the food and health of students, we encourage you to think broadly and to represent different backgrounds and identities. Below is a list of the types of stakeholders that can serve as a starting point for thinking about your advocacy group’s membership. Advocacy groups with five to ten people who can commit to the mission and the meeting schedule tend to be most productive in influencing change.

For your advocacy group, consider the following types of members:

  • Family members/caregivers of students
  • PTO/PTA Members
  • Teachers
  • School Garden/Community Garden representative
  • School board members
  • School Nurse/health professional working in the community
  • Community advocates
  • Representatives of community businesses who share the mission of healthy food
  • School Administration
  • School Health/Student Health Advisory Council members
  • Food Service Director/Food service staff

View our guide with considerations for these different types of members in your Advocacy Group.

For your advocacy group, consider the following types of members:

  • Family members/caregivers of students
  • PTO/PTA Members
  • Teachers
  • School Garden/Community Garden representative
  • School board members
  • School Nurse/health professional working in the community
  • Community advocates
  • Representatives of community businesses who share the mission of healthy food
  • School Administration
  • School Health/Student Health Advisory Council members
  • Food Service Director/Food service staff

View our guide with considerations for these different types of members in your Advocacy Group.

Reaching Out to Potential Members

Before you reach out to any possible members, it’s a good idea to prepare your elevator speech. Write out the answers to the following questions to prepare for your conversation:

  • What is the purpose of the advocacy group?
  • Why are you asking this individual specifically to join? How is their contribution critical to the group’s success? Mention their particular skills, interests, accomplishments in the community, etc.
  • What are the expectations for members? How will they be expected to contribute to the group’s overall goals and success?

For some communities, it works well to reach out to specific individuals that have demonstrated a shared interest, while others may prefer to post the opportunity more broadly. You are encouraged to do what is best for your school community. If you do reach out to people individually, keep in mind that different approaches may work better for different people. Consider the most appropriate medium - email, phone call, face to face - and what the other person may care about that overlaps with the purpose of the advocacy group.


Prepare yourself to hear “no.” This is part of the process in forming an advocacy group, plus remember that you only want members who can invest their time and energy into the purpose of the group. Everytime you hear a “no,” consider it an opportunity to still spread the message about the work that the advocacy group will be doing and offer to follow up with them in the future if they’re interested, such as with a specific initiative (for example, a gardening company representative when you implement a school garden program).


Finally, no matter who you ask, make sure to communicate your enthusiasm and inspiration. Share a few key data points that you’ve learned (check out Step 1: Get Educated for information you can share).

Run Effective Meetings

As the person leading meetings (or at least the first meeting), it’s important to create an atmosphere where the group can connect with each other and be productive. Here are some tips to keep in mind for your advocacy group meetings.

1

Identify a location and time that’s convenient for members. It doesn’t need to take place at your school, although many find that is an optimal location. Other venues to consider are your local library or community center, which may have free rooms that you can reserve.

2

If group members have young children, consider recruiting a volunteer to provide childcare during the meeting.

3

Provide healthy snacks and/or refreshments. (Get some inspiration from our recipes section here.)

4

Email in advance the agenda and any working documents or tasks that need to be completed prior to the meeting. Aim for a balance between providing enough information to allow for a productive meeting, and providing too much information that may overwhelm members. When in doubt, the agenda with a few talking points is sufficient.

5

Consider opening some meetings with a video or article that provides an anecdote of how small and/or grassroots changes can create a big impact in the health of students and a school community. Here are a few that we recommend:

Note: While these videos are from several years ago, the information is still relevant to current day school food.

6

Set a time limit and stick to it. We recommend meetings are no longer than 90 minutes, especially if they occur in the evenings. When you create your agenda, outline the amount of time for each activity. Build in a 5-minute break about mid-way through for any meeting that goes over 60 minutes to allow for stretching and use of the restroom.

7

Assign rotating or ongoing roles for each meeting:

  • Facilitator - Before the meeting, this person is responsible for identifying the topics for each meeting and drafting the agenda with input from group members. During the meeting, this person ushers the group through each agenda item as planned. This person should ask questions and not be afraid of pauses in discussion as members consider their response. If the group veers off topic, remind them that you have a jam-packed agenda and can add this new topic to the agenda for the next meeting. If this frequently occurs, it may be helpful to allocate 10 minutes at the end of each meeting for “other topics,” in which the group can discuss items that are time-sensitive but were not built into the agenda.
  • Timekeeper - This person is responsible for making sure the meeting starts and ends on time by monitoring when the group is scheduled to move on to a new section of the agenda. It is helpful for this person to provide five-minute and two-minute warnings as the group approaches the end of the allotted time for each agenda item.
  • Notetaker - During the meeting this person is responsible for following and documenting the conversation in the meeting. After the meeting, they are responsible for typing up the notes and distributing to the group.
8

Print copies of the agenda and any working documents for the meeting.

9

Test the technology set-up for the space, especially if you’ll be using a powerpoint or sharing a video that requires the internet. We recommend reserving the space 30 minutes before the meeting starts to set up and troubleshoot any issues that may come up.

10

Bring any supplies that may be needed for activities or to support dynamic discussion. We suggest having access to or utilizing at least one of the following: a white board with a variety of marker colors, a chalkboard with a variety of chalk colors, or poster-sized paper that you can tape to walls for brainstorming/discussion notes.

Meeting Tips

Tips for Your Kick-Off Meeting

It’s important to identify goals for each meeting. We recommend following the below format for your first meeting to lay the foundation for future meetings to be as productive as possible.

Meeting Tips

Tips for Your Kick-Off Meeting

It’s important to identify goals for each meeting. We recommend following the below format for your first meeting to lay the foundation for future meetings to be as productive as possible.

Goals for a Kick-Off Meeting:

  1. To inspire the members of the advocacy group.
  2. To determine the mission and goals of the group.
  3. To establish the role of each member.
  4. To create next steps for each member to complete after the meeting.

An important note: Make sure to communicate to members that roles and responsibilities can and may change over time. What is decided in this meeting is not set in stone, rather, it is a starting point to determine what will and won’t work for your specific group. Ask members to provide feedback on these decisions to the best of their ability with the information that they have available now, and offer a time to revisit in a few months to determine if anything needs to be adjusted.

Here’s a sample agenda for your kick-off meeting to get you started on the right foot. Feel free to customize this for the needs of your group, especially considering how much time you may have set aside for this meeting.

Tips for Ongoing Meetings

Although it may not sound fun, having a clear structure for your meetings will ensure that members know what to expect - from how often you’ll meet to how they can and should provide feedback. Consider the following for your meetings:

1

Survey the group to determine the best schedule for upcoming meetings, such as how often they would like to meet and the location for the meetings. Aim to hold meetings every other week to keep momentum going.

2

Based on feedback, create a schedule for meetings and share it with the group. Ask the group how they’d like to receive this type of information, such as: via email, a shared Google drive, a private social media group, etc.

3

Book the space that the group will use for upcoming meetings in advance, and if possible, in bulk.

4

Ask for feedback from group members on agenda items prior to each meeting.

You’re ready for the next step!

Check out the Get Support section.

You’re ready for the next step!

Check out the Get Support section.

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