AWETHU School of Organising

Week 1 of our second ever AWETHU cohort! 🎉 It was beautiful to share this space of building and organising for a better future together, whilst outside the far right mobilised on the streets of London. AWETHU 2025 couldn’t have started at a more vital time! We started off with building on the foundations of those before us, specifically the Combahee River Collective, having honest discussions on what we can learn from Black Feminism. Our dream board began and we dived straight into organising vs mobilising, why collective statements matter and practical ways to organise. Mpho made an incredible home cooked curry and sticky toffee pudding with pineapple for lunch (we are so blessed to be fed like this!) Everyone was sent home with @awethu tote bags and notebooks and some lovely gifts from @lush and @minorfigures ! Swipe through ➡️ for books, gifts, teaching moments and food shots 💚🩷 7 more weeks to go!

LAUNCHING AWETHU 2025 ✊🏽 After the incredible success of 2024s Pilot Cohort, we’re thrilled to launch the 2025 cohort for AWETHU School of Organising!✨ Last year exceeded all our expectations — shared knowledge, building community, and making change. Soon, we'll be ready to open the doors to even more students. 🙌🏾 Help us make it happen! You can support us by donating to our crowdfunding campaign [Link in bio] 🔗 , sharing this post & donation link, and engaging with our work here on socials. All funds raised will go towards - covering travel and food for our young people 🥘 - helping us pay for the venue 🏫 - cover costs for stationery and supplies 📝 - cover costs for guest-facilitators 🧑🏾‍🏫 Every contribution, large or small, makes a huge difference. 🩷💚

WE JUST FINISHED OUR FIRST EVER CURRICULUM DELIVERY WITH OUR FIRST EVER @awethu COHORT 🥳✊🏽🩷💚 our final day was filled with tears at this phase being over, our cohort presenting their plans for how they will continue to organise around their chosen causes, loving messages of encouragement for the organising journey ahead, jollof rice, laughter, dancing and so much more. These last 8 weeks have been truly transformational! Many of our Class of 2024 said being part of @awethu has been the best experience of their whole lives. We are so proud of them and the journeys they have been on. Now, they’ll have mentors for the next year! Getting to run @awethu has already been a dream come true for us (@mikaelaloach and @jessmally ) and this is only the beginning! We can’t wait to get going again with more cohorts in 2025 and much more - so keep you eyes peeled for when applications launch again next year AND if you want to help fund this work to make it possible, either contribute to our Open Collective or if you have access to bigger grants/funds then pop us an email at [email protected] ✊🏽🩷💚 a better world IS possible - if we organise for it!

ONLINE INFO SESSION 🥳 Join us on Friday, 15th May at 6.30pm for our online info session. If you have any questions about the application process, the 8 week course itself or anything else about AWETHU in Brighton, this is the place to be. We’ll share more about the curriculum over the 8 weeks, what to expect, how we’ll be supporting those who attend and more. Link to register on bio 🔗 #awethu #joinus

We’re so sorry to have to cancel our in person info session with @blackatsussex tomorrow evening 🚫 if you registered you’ll be getting an email inviting you to join one of our online sessions instead - the link to register for these is in the application form linked in our bio. We can’t wait to meet our 2026 cohort so PLEASE apply now for our FREE Brighton & Hove program (running Sundays September-end of October 2026) 📄 If you have any reservations about applying or any questions at all, please feel free to email [email protected] with any questions and ofc come to our info sessions to hear more ✊🏽🌍🌎🌏

🚨 APPLY FOR OUR FREE 2026 SUSSEX COHORT NOW AT AWETHU.CO.UK 🚨 After two amazing years of AWETHU cohorts in London, we are so so excited to launch our 8 week program outside of London with a whole new group of people - and you could be one of them!! 🥳 Please share this widely with friends, groups and organisations who might be interested or connected to young people who would be interested 🙏🏽 If you are: ⁃ Black (of African or Black Caribbean Descent) ⁃ Between 18 - 24 years old ⁃ Able to attend all 8 Sundays in Central Brighton from 6th September - 25th October 2026 (travel stipends for travel within Sussex are available for those who need it and any lost pay can also be covered) YOU SHOULD APPLY NOW! 🏃🏿🏃🏾 🚨Applications close on Sunday, 28th June 2026 midnight BST🚨 ❓Keen to get more info for yourself/a friend/your kid/relative before applying or ask more about your application? Come along to our FREE Zoom info sessions with @mikaelaloach and Jess Mally on - you can register to come on the application form at the link in the @awethu bio. 🙏🏽 UPDATE: in person info session at Uni of Sussex has been cancelled 🚨 please come to an online info session instead You don’t need any experience or expertise! Just a passion for playing your part in making this world better for our communities. ✊🏿✊🏽✊🏾 We can’t wait to meet you! (Additional info: our venue is fully wheelchair accessible, you can choose to send voice notes rather than written responses for the application form. Any questions please email [email protected])

ANNOUNCEMENT 🥳 We are back for our 2026 cohort and are so excited to announce that @awethu is coming to BRIGHTON & HOVE 🥳🥳🥳 We can’t wait to bring our practical political education program on Climate Justice and Black Liberation that we’ve delivered twice in London now to our communities across Sussex ✊🏽🌍 If you are: ✅18-24 years old ✅Black or Black mixed ✅Interested in making change in your community ✅ Based in Sussex Then make sure you apply NOW (link in bio!) to be part of our 2026 cohort! Our 8 week program is free-to-access, our venue is fully wheelchair accessible AND we can offer travel and missed work stipends for those who need it. 💚🩷 @mikaelaloach will be running an in person Info Session 18:00-19:30 at the University of Sussex on Wednesday 29th April. Come along to hear more about AWETHU in Brighton & Hove! (Swipe for flyer) Please share this with a friend, keep following us and stay tuned for more info! Let us know in the comments where else you’d like to see us deliver our 8 week program in the future as AWETHU grows ✊🏽🌍

We made the thing we wish we’d had real 🥹 @AWETHU started from a conversation @jessmally and I had about frustrations and dreams we’d both been having about climate and social movements. It takes a lot to make dreams and ideas a reality, so I’m ridiculously proud that we’ve now run TWO YEARS of the curriculum we built on strategic organising around Climate Justice and Black Liberation ✊🏽💚🩷 We’ve now got two years of @awethu graduates most of whom had never organised before and now since being part of our 8-week program they’ve started up new grassroots groups organising around everything from Congolese diaspora solidarity ( @congoleseroots ) to queer migrant coalition building to increasing access to the arts for working class Black people to solidarity with the Niger Delta and much much more. Honestly proud doesn’t cover how I feel about @awethu our alumni & team. We’ve made this all possible with limited resource which is beautiful in some ways (we do this because we care so deeply! neither @jessmally nor I get paid for our @AWETHU work) but difficult in others (avoiding burnout is a struggle having to juggle other jobs to pay our bills so we can do this work for free). @awethu has been possible because of contributions from you guys to our Open Collective (in bio!) and grants we’ve been awarded from @blagravetrust & @rearc.institute . We’re applying for more for next year not just so we can keep doing this work (our funds so far have paid for travel, stipends to cover missed work, food etc for our cohorts so its fully accessible) but also so we can expand our vision AND crucially be well resourced and sustainable in doing this work 🙏🏽🩷 Organising is what builds the capacity for revolutionary change to be possible - so resourcing, supporting and politically educating new organisers to understand climate justice and Black liberation, and how to strategically organise towards both, is vitally important in the face of climate breakdown and the rise of the far right. If you want to support our work you can become a regular contributor on our OC (linked on AWETHU.co.uk) or if you have access to bigger funds you can email us at [email protected] 🙏🏽🩷💚✊🏽

We have some exciting news 🥁… Since launching the Roots & Routes Fund earlier this year, we’re proud to announce the first climate justice grantees. Here’s a look at the six brilliant youth-led climate justice organisations we’re proud to support - each driving change in their communities, rooted in lived experience, creativity, and justice. 1️⃣ @awethu : A school for climate justice changemaking, empowering Black African and Caribbean youth aged 18–24. 2️⃣ @earth.tenders : A BPOC-led land justice initiative in South London, reclaiming land for community use and food growing. 3️⃣ @thelandcollective : Supporting underrepresented young people to pursue careers in sustainable built environments. 4️⃣ @youthclimatecollab : Building youth leadership through training, convening, and community-building. 5️⃣ @mafia_weekend : A majority LGBTQIA+ organisation using participatory storytelling to amplify underrepresented voices in climate justice. 6️⃣ @timetogrowcommunity : A grassroots group promoting food sovereignty and local growing as tools for climate and social justice. A big thank you to @coop_foundation , @energysavingtrust , @impatienceearth and OVO Foundation for making this happen! #YouthLed #ClimateJustice #YouthLeadership #ClimateAction #RootsAndRoutes #YoungChangemakers #SocialJustice #TheBlagraveTrust

Our AWETHU 2025 cohort have graduated from our 8 week curriculum on Climate Justice and Black Liberation and we couldn’t be prouder of them all 🥹🩷💚 We closed our journey with reflection, honesty, love, and celebration ❤️✨ Our grounding session was centred on lamenting; taking time to grieve together for our siblings in Jamaica and share everything weighing on our hearts. Holding space for each other reminded us that collective care is part of the work. 🤍 We were joined by a representative from @blmuk , who shared his experiences, mistakes, lessons, and wisdom on what it truly means to organise. The cohort then broke into working groups, presenting their next steps - some beginning their own projects, others joining collectives and building coalitions. With feedback from @jessmally , @mikaelaloach and the BLMUK representative, the room was full of energy, clarity, and purpose. 💭✊🏾 After a hearty vegan lasagna lunch, we finalised our vision board, capturing everything we’ve built, imagined, and learned together. ☁️ And of course, we ended the night with a graduation ceremony, presentations from 2025 @awethu graduates on the causes they will be organising around (from solidarity with the Niger Delta to queer migrant solidarity), music, vegan bites, dancing, and so much love. It was lovely to be joined by some alumni from the 2024 cohort 💐✨ From grieving to celebrating, from imagining to organising — this week was a reminder that the work continues, but we never do it alone. ❤️ Swipe ➡️ to see moments from our final week: reflection, laughter, and liberation in motion. If you’re interested in supporting our work for 2026, please do reach out to [email protected] 📧 Keen to join our 2026 cohort? Keep your eyes peeled for application info 👀

What does strategising look like in practice? What do we look out for when joining an organising group? How do we reach out to people who want to organise with us? How do we create action plans? 🧐 This week we kept building on our causes, getting even more practical about how to make real change happen. Studying Organising 101, Axioms for Organisers and Mobilising vs Organising, we shared tips, advice, and lessons to keep moving forward in our organising journeys 🖊️ Our grounding exercise was flower watering 💐, where we took time to appreciate and affirm one another. Reminding us that valuing each other and holding one another in care is just as important to organising as strategy and structure. Thank you @arowahsounds for introducing us to this exercise in last years cohort - we absolutely love it 🌸 We were also joined by a guest from @greenpeaceuk to talk to us about micro grants! They walked us through the application process and explained how Greenpeace can continue backing our cohort and their causes moving forward ✊🏾 For Congo Week, we had a powerful session led by AWETHU alum Christevie, who spoke about her journey after the programme; working with @congoleseroots for a Free Congo 🇨🇩. It’s inspiring to see how lessons from AWETHU continue to ripple out into real world organising. And of course, vegan pizza for lunch because good food keeps the movement going! We ended day in our working groups, reflecting and planning our next steps forward. Swipe ➡️ to see moments of discussion, flower watering and building causes in action 🤝✨

What steps do we take to organise around a cause? Where do we start when turning an idea into action? 🧐 Week 6 was all about Organising 101 - getting practical, grounded and strategic about how to make change happen. We spent the day developing our causes and mapping out how to move forward: defining missions, planning first meetings and building structures that can hold our visions 🧱 To see organising in action, @mikaelaloach shared a case study from @fossilfreebooks 📚 : Book workers organising in solidarity with Palestine and against complicity with the fossil fuel industry in the literary industry. Drawing inspiration from Jane McAlevey’s trade union principles - using the core fundamentals of her “Organising 4 Power” course to build solidarity rooted in structure, participation and strategy. Their story offered real practical lessons from planning and thoughtful decision making to building collective power and navigating challenges together. Solidarity is not abstract; it’s built through action and coordination ✊🏾 Swipe ➡️ to see us in discussion, mapping out ideas and building the foundations of movements that can truly last 🤝