Getting Started

• Invite people who you think would be interested in public deliberation to help you.
   
• Form a planning committee to help find ways to implement deliberative discussions in your community organization.
   
• Start out small. For your first forum, gather friends or a group that already meets, and discuss a relevant topic.
   
• Partner with an experienced moderator. A moderator is someone who knows how to conduct and record a forum. Click here to find a moderator.
   
• Create goals and a mission statement for your organization.  Share it and get input from your partners.

Forming (and Sustaining) Partnerships

• Build a base of support for local issue forums to ensure broad participation and spread the workload of volunteers.
   
• [But who do I contact and how?]
   
• Start with one or two partnerships. As your program grows, add more and increase the diversity of your contacts.
   
• Be inclusive. It's not much of a public forum if only a small percentage of the public is involved.
   
• Give partners the opportunity to participate in the earliest planning stages and allow them to contribute their special talents.
   
• Make sure your partners understand the mission and goals of your organization and have clearly defined roles.
   
• Communicate with them. Ask about their expectations and how they hope to benefit.

Choosing a Topic

The topic you choose will help shape your forum. Some issues evoke intellectual discussions and others personal reactions.

• Gather informational resources, discussion guides, and research. Click here for links to sites with guides to order, download, or print. Many are free.
   
• Choose an issue that will resonate with your group. Until the group is comfortable with each other and with deliberating, you should avoid highly charged topics.
   
• Keep in mind, deliberation is a process that may not lend itself to quick action.

Organizing Your Forum

• Make sure publicity is well timed and accurate.
   
• Schedule a facility for your forum. Allow 2 to 3 hours, and plan to arrive 30 minutes early and stay 30 minutes late.
   
• Arrange for written materials (discussion guides, etc) to be distributed in advance.
   
• Organize chairs in a horseshoe or other interactive arrangement. Try to have at least 8 participants for an adequate flow of deliberation.
   
• Find out from moderators and recorders what they will need - flip chart easels, pads, markers, tape - and have them set up.
   
• Arrange early for additional needs such as a TV/VCR, extension cords, posters, sign-in sheet, refreshments, and childcare.

Keep in mind, there are many ways to define
success for a forum!

I want to print this!
(Microsoft Word file)