We're In This Together.
In the rise of fascism, we know that it is up to us to show up for one another and practice the skills to be free together. It is more important than ever that our organizations embody the kind of democratic decision making, multi-racial solidarity, and collaborative approaches to conflict that we advocate for on a transnational scale.
This Summer bluelight academy is recommitting to being a network connector for liberatory leaders. As a trans and BIPOC led worker cooperative, Spring Up has been practicing shared leadership, non-punitive harm response, and liberation psychology for over a decade. We know that now is the moment for us to double down on the movements that trained and nurtured our leadership, and show up for the liberatory educators, organizers, and care workers who are seeking thought partnership and tools to sustain themselves. That is why we have decreased prices across the board for all of our retreats, expanded our scholarship offerings, and grown our database of free resources. If you have the resources to invest in your learning and growth, bluelight academy of the liberatory arts will not only give you lifetime access to resources and tools, but also make sure the funds you invest go the distance on providing more access to those who have less financial support.
Introducing our Best Deal Yet:
The Liberatory Leadership Bundle Includes All Summer 2025 Webinars and Retreats with up to $925 off
Consider purchasing all summer webinars and retreats to build the most robust toolkit and have a summer full of values aligned connections and personal support! This bundle grants you access to all live daylong retreats and webinars offered in Summer 2025. All programming takes place on Fridays, with retreats taking place from 8:30-3:30 PT / 11:30-5:30 ET (with a 1 hour break in the middle) and webinars taking place from 2-3:30 PT / 5-6:60 ET. If you're unable to attend some webinars live, you can check out the recording afterward. And if you cannot attend one of the retreats, you can transfer your registration to a fall 2025 retreat instead.
In addition to 4 daylong retreats and 6 webinars, registration for this bundle includes four 1:1 confidential coaching sessions that you can book based on your availability with anyone from the Spring Up Collective that aligns with your needs.
Summer Schedule:
Spend your Friday's learning + building community with like-minded leaders
- May 16th | Collective Governance: Sharing Power Through Sociocracy | 90m Webinar: Attend live, or check out the recording
- May 23rd | Liberatory Facilitation: Holding Space to Be Free Together | Attend the daylong virtual retreat LIVE
- May 30th | Consensus + Conflict: Harnessing the Wisdom of Disagreement | 90m Webinar: Attend live, or check out the recording
- Recommendation: Use your first 1-2 coaching sessions in early June
- June 20th | Practicing Cooperation: Power + Consent in Decision Making (A Hands-On Introduction to Sociocratic Governance) | Attend the daylong virtual retreat LIVE
- June 27th | Meeting the Moment: Adaptive Organizational Strategy for 2025 + Beyond | 90m Webinar: Attend live, or check out the recording
- July 4th | Accountability and Shifting Relations to the Land (portion of the proceeds go to Indigenous mutual aid efforts) | 90m Webinar: Attend live, or check out the recording
- July 18th | My Liberation is Tied to Yours: Race + Liberation Psychology | 90m Webinar: Attend live, or check out the recording
- July 25th | Solidarity Strategies: Equitable Multi-Racial Collaboration | Attend the daylong virtual retreat LIVE
- Recommendation: Use your next 1-2 coaching sessions in late July / early August
- August 8th | Harm Systems Design: Non-Punitive Approaches from Organizing to HR | Attend the daylong virtual retreat LIVE
- August 15th | "That's Not My Job:" Equitable Workload Distribution and Feminized Labor | 90m Webinar: Attend live, or check out the recording
Bundle Contents
4 Coaching Sessions Included
Our collaborative approach to coaching is based in a non-hierarchical relationship that is solution focused — coaches recognize that clients are experts in their own lived experience. Coaching is strengths-based and culturally specific in that coaches help the client enhance their inherent strengths, skills, and resources accessible to them.
These sessions can be utilized for a variety of goals including, but not limited to:
- Integrating new things you're learning and applying the frameworks from retreats and webinars to real world situations
- Practicing generative conflict skills and analyzing past or active conflicts
- Practicing liberatory facilitation skills - including collaboratively designing agendas, community agreements, feedback forms and more
-
Engaging in equitable design for your organizational systems and practices
Learning Portal
When you sign up for the retreat pack, you will get access to each retreat's accompanying online learning portal. On that portal you will be invited to introduce yourself and share a bit about what you are hoping to learn from that specific retreat - this introduction will be used to help us sort you into aligned breakout spaces, so please do so as soon as you are able. You will also see the agenda for that retreat, an introduction to your facilitators, as well as an overview of our community agreements and harm response process.
The learning portal for the Liberatory Facilitation Retreat includes our Facilitation Guide, which is a 25 page workbook detailing all of our core facilitation tools and frameworks, as well as case studies, worksheets to prepare for your facilitation, and suggested resources to learn more.
Webinars and retreats include dozens of additional resources on the platform in addition to the live space including recommended books, essays, podcasts and so much more.
You will also find our safety and care plan that we encourage you to fill out in order to identify your support system and plan for how to care for yourself before, during, and after each retreat.
The learning portal for the Harm Systems Design Retreat includes two pre-work worksheets, one is required and one is optional for you to fill out before the retreat as well as a few tools to learn more about design thinking as a framework for updating your systems and protocols.
During each retreat:
- There will be plenty of space for you to ask questions or guide the learning based on what you need support in
- We encourage you to take care of yourself and do what will make you feel most comfortable including standing up, sitting down, laying down, stimming, turning your camera off, eating, moving around, stepping in and out of the room as needed
- Closed captions will be on for the entire retreat and all text on slides will be read aloud. There is also space for you to let your facilitator and breakout group peers know if there are other requests that could support you
- Most slides have accompanying visuals to support you in digesting information through text and imagery
- There are consistent breaks and pauses throughout the retreat in addition to the 1 hour break in the middle of the day
- Some breakout prompts include the option to journal independently instead of having conversation which allows you to choose how you prefer to digest and integrate what you are learning
- There are optional prompts throughout the day for somatic and embodied activities to get you into your body or to play a game. It is totally up to you if that is something that feels right, or if you would prefer to opt out.
Before each retreat, we encourage you to let us know if you have specific accessibility needs that you would like us to meet. You can request live ASL interpretation, Spanish interpretation, visual descriptions, or other needs. Please try to give us at least 2 weeks notice for ASL or Spanish access.
Once each retreat is complete, you will get access to the slides from the day as well as suggestions for how you can learn more about the topics explored within the retreat. We will also share a feedback form for you to tell us how the experience was for you or if you have any suggestions to make it a better experience in the future.
