National Domestic Workers Alliance Sol Initiative

NDWA Participants

The National Domestic Workers Alliance Sol Initiative is a leadership development training and movement-building collaboration between the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA), Generative Somatics and Social Justice Leadership. SJL has prioritized this national collaboration with NDWA because of the tremendous potential the National Domestic Workers Alliance and its affiliates hold to develop a model of Transformative Organizing that can win meaningful victories at scale and build a social justice movement in the US and globally that is led by working class women of color.

Founded in 2007, the National Domestic Workers Alliance organizes domestic workers in the United States for respect, recognition and labor standards. Through leadership development, strategic campaigns and alliance-building , NDWA helps build a vibrant movement for social and global justice. NDWA is made up of 33 organizations representing domestic workers in 17 cities across the country.

Domestic workers’ movements nationally and globally have the opportunity to make significant advances over the next several years as evidenced in the United States by successful organizing for the Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights (the state legislation passed in New York in 2010) and internationally through successful organizing for international protections for domestic workers (the ILO convention passed in 2011). NDWA has played a critical role in these victories and is poised for further success in supporting the work of its affiliates to win the Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights in other states and through its leadership in the potentially transformative Caring Across Generations national campaign.

To support these efforts and in order to advance a model of Transformative Organizing within a national network, SJL has partnered with the National Domestic Workers Alliance and Generative Somatics to develop the Sol Initiative, a movement-building training program for NDWA member organizations. It aims to improve the effectiveness and impact of individuals, organizations, and the domestic workers movement, and to build the capacity of domestic workers in relating to and strengthening the broader social justice movement.

The Sol Training Initiative has two tracks to support both emerging domestic worker organizations and leaders as well as more established domestic worker organizations and leaders. These tracks focus on:

  1. Vision: Mission, theory of social change, principles and values
  2. Strategy: Methods of assessing conditions; approaches, goals and objectives of external work; and orientation towards collaborations and movement building
  3. Impact: Outcomes in base building, leadership development, campaign, and movement building
  4. Organizational Culture: high performance, internal communication, grassroots leadership, and interpersonal dynamics
  5. Infrastructure: Funding, clear systems of decision making, organizational systems and supporting worker-leaders as organizers

In addition to providing advanced leadership development training and support, the Sol Initiative will also create a space for dialogue within the national NDWA network about the need for innovation and expansion in domestic worker organizing.

Several current leaders and staff within NDWA first engaged with SJL through its earliest programs in New York City in which Domestic Workers United, a NDWA affiliate, participated. Through the Sol Initiative, SJL is now deepening its work with these proven leaders and expanding its reach to train 70 grassroots leaders and staff of domestic worker organizations across the country. The Sol Initiative was launched in 2011 and involves a series of multi-day trainings as well as ongoing coaching support and evaluation to ensure the program meets the goals, needs and opportunities of NWDA and its affiliates as they work to put a Transformative Organizing model into practice within their organizations and campaigns over the next two years.

NDWA Sol Initiative Organizations