Union Coordinator

Rural people are busy people, especially. They struggle each day to take care of their families, farms and businesses. A Union Coordinator — either a part time paid volunteer or staff member — is required to be responsible to facilitate the process of community-led action to achieve the SDGs.

Duties of the Union Coordinator

  • Targeting and Reporting on all SDG Union Activities in the Union
  • Meeting (virtually or in person) weekly with the Upazila Coordinator

Training for Union Coordinators

Purpose of the activity

To build understanding among Union Coordinators on THP’s principles and core values     and it SDG Union strategies, programs, implementation process so that they can play a facilitative role in building SDG Unions.

Facilitation – what type of person or team is required to facilitate the activity? 

  • THP Training Unit
  • THP regional staff

          **A team of 2-3 facilitators is required for the course.

Preparation – what should be done before the activity?

  • Contents, related handouts and PPT development
  • Facilitator team formation
  • Finalization of a date, time and venue
  • Inviting the participants to attend the course
  • Logistics arrangement
  • Venue preparation

Participants – who should participate? How many in each session?

  •  Union Coordinators

           **30-35 participants should be present in each course.

Duration – how long does it take?

It is a 2 days long residential course.

Financial cost items

  • Materials
  • Food
  • Venue
  • Accommodation
  • Conveyance for the participants
  • Communication cost

What are the “transformative” aspects of this activity? It shifts the mindset of participants from what to what?

  • The participants identify themselves as leaders of volunteers and their responsibility is to inspire and engage all volunteers in community actions for achieving SDGs  
  • They start to believe that their role not just doing a job rather than a mission of transforming their own communities.
  • Upon participation in this training, the mindset of the participants shifts: from employee to volunteerism; from the service delivery approach to right based/community led approach

What are the content/factual learning objectives of the activity?

  • To gain a clear concept of SDGs and THP introduced SDG Union strategy
  • To have knowledge and skill to build and cultivate Village development team, GGS and Youth unit at village level and other social units like Union Volunteer forum, Union Shujan Chapter etc. at Union level
  • To gain knowledge about role and technics of functioning of Union Parishad including Ward Shava and standing committees
  • To have their own as well as their community vision and identify the actions that will required to fulfill their vision for realizing SDG village/union.
  • To gain idea about THPs principles and core values which are critically important to work as Union Coordinators
  • To identify their own role and responsibilities

Flow: from “welcome” to “thank you” what are the spaces the participants are taken through? If there are “power questions” that prompt each step, what are they?

  • Welcome speech
  • Expectation and aim of the training
  • Introduction and rules of the event
  • THP’s vision, Mission, principles and core values
  • Concept of SDGs
  • SDG Union strategy and its components
  • Village mobilization: VDT, GSS, and Youth Unit
  • Social Units: Union Volunteer Forum, Youth Forum, Union Shujan Chapter, BNN, GGS forum, 
  • Union Parishad: Ward Shava, Standing Committees
  • Union coordinators role and responsibilities

Follow-up: what should happen after the activity and how will we record it?

  • Evaluate UCs performance and gaps identifies  
  • Take actions for further improvement