APALA Organizing Institute...
This past weekend, I attended training in Los Angeles called the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance Organizing Institute, whose premise is training people about labor union organizing and how to recruit workers. Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance (APALA) is a national labor contingency organization under the American Federation of Labor - Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO).
Being packed into the UCLA Labor Center right next to Macarthur Park in Los Angeles, about 50 people coming from many different communities with organizing history participated in the Organizing Institute. I was one of the few youth who participated in the program, and there were also many union organizers from around the country who participated in the program. What I learned from APALA is something that I am going to apply to my future organizing, because one of the main focuses of the training was recruiting workers to join labor unions. The training was intense in the sense that I have never done any type of organizing around the topic of labor unions and workers; some of the issues that we discussed were wages, benefit, respect & dignity, working conditions, etc.
The most important thing that I have learned from the program was community, because the participants were people from diverse generations, diverse backgrounds and different organizing experiences. I got a chance to learn from people who are leaders longer than I have since I start organizing. One experience was during an action at a carwash on Vermont, I was chanting with an elderly Filipina woman. Another moment that I will remember is talking to Vietnamese organizers, in Vietnamese too!
I miss the people, and their energy,
<3 Tommy
Being packed into the UCLA Labor Center right next to Macarthur Park in Los Angeles, about 50 people coming from many different communities with organizing history participated in the Organizing Institute. I was one of the few youth who participated in the program, and there were also many union organizers from around the country who participated in the program. What I learned from APALA is something that I am going to apply to my future organizing, because one of the main focuses of the training was recruiting workers to join labor unions. The training was intense in the sense that I have never done any type of organizing around the topic of labor unions and workers; some of the issues that we discussed were wages, benefit, respect & dignity, working conditions, etc.
The most important thing that I have learned from the program was community, because the participants were people from diverse generations, diverse backgrounds and different organizing experiences. I got a chance to learn from people who are leaders longer than I have since I start organizing. One experience was during an action at a carwash on Vermont, I was chanting with an elderly Filipina woman. Another moment that I will remember is talking to Vietnamese organizers, in Vietnamese too!
I miss the people, and their energy,
<3 Tommy