Social Action Coordination

Leader works with the leadership team to engage members in service and advocacy for justice as it is rooted in our biblical tradition. She encourages work on the quadrennial priorities of United Methodist Women National Office for the greatest potential impact for change. Visit unitedmethodistwomen.org/action for these priorities.

Conference social action leaders shall promote and interpret the biblical basis for social action and the position of The United Methodist Church on social issues, using the Social Principles (The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church, 2016) and The Book of Resolutions of The United Methodist Church, 2016. She will:

1. serve as a member (or members) of the leadership team;
2. work with the leadership team and United Methodist Women National Office to create a plan of action on one or more of the national issue priorities, and set a goal for a concrete “win” on the issue(s) in your conference;
3. train district social action counterparts; work closely with district social action leaders to plan ongoing district-level work on the issues, and serve as the main contact to catalyze local and district work on social action to enable districts to learn from each other and help them to locate resources from United Methodist Women; as feasible, offer skills training in service and advocacy around conference priority issues;
4. work with the vice president and district social action leaders to plan an annual or bi-annual state legislative event; this may be with ecumenical partners and, as feasible, would focus on United Methodist Women social action priority issues;
5. work closely with the UMW conference spiritual growth coordinator to integrate biblical and theological focus into all social action work;
6. work closely with the UMW membership coordinator to explore ways to engage new members in United Methodist Women through social action; 
7. resource the conference communicator for the website, print newsletter, emails and other communications, and encourage district counterparts to do so;
8. serve on the following conference UMW committees: Charter for Racial Justice, program and others as assigned; and
9. perform other duties if assigned, such as:
   1. represent United Methodist Women on your conference Church and Society committee (may have another name); bring the priorities and concerns of United Methodist Women and explore areas for collaboration;
   2. get to know other justice leaders within your conference, and with the leadership team seek to build alliances with other committees and caucuses, such as Religion and Race, Status and Role of Women, racial/ethnic caucuses, Hispanic/Latino ministries and others. Consider how such alliances can advance work around your issue priorities (e.g., collaboration on resolutions to your annual conference, education and strategy development on one or more issue priorities, etc.) and advance conference goals.

Contact your staff liaison for questions and clarifications.