What Does It Mean to be an Organizer?

Our Fellows began Week 2 with a discussion of what it means to be an organizer, as well as the necessary skills to be an organizer—an exciting topic for YOI Fellow Sheilly Martinez (she/her), who explained, “I applied to YOI because I already was an activist from Hempstead, so I wanted to continue to develop more of my organizing skills, and I really wanted to do that through YOI.”

“This past week, we learned a lot of new things,” said Sheilly. “We learned what it meant to be an organizer. We learned the skills that come with that. It was a lot this week, starting off with the steps of knowing who we’re reaching, what’s our audience, and how to have a conversation.”

They then practiced certain skills, including practicing conversations in preparation for phonebanking to get out the vote for the August primary.

“It was fun! It was a little awkward at first, but once you get into the role of it, you start to realize that I should be able to get adjusted to this and be able to know how to respond because I’m helping to make a change and I’m pushing others to know what’s the importance of voting,” Sheilly reflected.