EPA's Community Involvement University (CIU) provides critical community involvement knowledge and skills training for EPA staff working on Superfund sites. CIU is a training platform offering EPA Community Involvement Coordinators, Remedial Project Managers, On-Scene Coordinators and other EPA and EPA-affiliated staff the opportunity to build the necessary skills, techniques and practices to engage the community in the Superfund process. CIU delivers a variety of courses each year at regional offices based on regional training needs. The curriculum of courses and webinars includes collaboration, facilitation, public participation, risk communication, spokesperson, writing and other training supporting successful community involvement at Superfund sites.

The CIU is managed by the Community Involvement and Program Initiatives Branch (CIPIB) in the Office of Superfund Remediation and Technology Innovation (OSRTI). Tina Conley manages CIU; she can be reached at 703-603-0696 or conley.tina@epa.gov.

CIU offers one- to three-day basic, intermediate and advanced courses. Courses are scheduled based on requests received from Regional Community Involvement Managers, CIU representatives, and other Superfund Program staff. The CIU Brochure is updated as needed. Detailed course information can be found at http://www.trainex.org/catalog/bypartner_view.cfm?partner=CIU.

Collaboration Courses

Intermediate Courses
• Applying Collaboration to EPA Decision-Making: Learn how to plan and implement a collaboration process that can be applied to any process with diverse stakeholders, whether internally, with other agencies, and with public stakeholders.
• Building Cultural Competence: Learn a new way to look at, talk about and manage diversity both within EPA site teams and with communities. Core concepts include taking personal responsibility for the quality of one’s work life and generating positive field results based on enlightened self-interest.
• Building Trust in EPA: Learn how to get people to trust and work with you and manage interactions with angry citizens and activists.

Facilitation Courses

Basic Courses
• Facilitation Training (Basic): Enhance participants’ skills to plan and effectively facilitate various types of meetings.
• Making Meetings Work: Approaches and Tools for Better Meetings: Learn basic principles to plan effective meetings and achieve meeting goals.
• Practical Skills for Better Stories: A Narrative Framework for Community Involvement and Conflict Resolution at Superfund Sites Webinar: Learn about CPRC’s A Narrative Framework for Community Involvement and Conflict Resolution at Superfund Sites and how to use narrative tools in your community involvement work.
• Teaching Negotiation for Effective Communication & Conflict Resolution: Learn how making the processes of negotiation, mediation, and communication transparent and equal between parties will decrease the potential for misunderstanding and misperceptions.

Intermediate Courses
• Designing and Managing Effective Community Advisory Groups (CAGs): Learn what makes advisory groups work and gain the knowledge and skills needed to convene healthy, functional boards.
• Designing Effective Public Meetings and Events: Learn the fundamentals required to design and implement forums for genuine and productive dialogue.
• Facilitating Effective Superfund Public Meetings and Events: Learn the principles of powerful facilitation and how to create an effective facilitative presence at public meetings and events.

Advanced Courses
• Facilitation Training (Advanced): Further enhance participants’ ability to serve as effective facilitators in meeting situations.

Public Participation Courses

• Basic Courses
  • Community Involvement Tools and Techniques: Equip participants with tools and techniques to plan effective outreach and involvement strategies at Superfund sites.
  • Elements of Powerful Public Participation: Discover the larger decision-making framework that they fit into as professionals working in today’s world.
  • Foundations in Public Participation: Provides a broad-based learning experience covering all of the foundations of civic engagement and provides useful tools for designing and implementing practical, real-world public involvement programs.
  • Planning for Participation: Trends and Opportunities with Community Involvement Plans: Outlines a sitespecific strategy to enable meaningful community involvement throughout the Superfund cleanup process.
  • Public Participation for Managers: Provides an overview of how to use public participation to improve decisionmaking.
  • Public Participation for Technical Staff – How to Make Public Participation Work for You: Learn how to use public participation to improve site planning and key decision-making.
  • Systematic Development of Informed Consent (SDIC): Discover the larger decision-making framework that they fit into as professionals working in today’s world.

• Intermediate Courses
  • Planning for Powerful Public Participation: Discover the larger decision-making framework that they fit into as professionals working in today’s world.
  • Superfund Success: Tools and Techniques for Community Involvement Train-the-Trainer Webinar: Learn how to deliver the tools and techniques training to your colleagues that conduct community involvement activities.

Advanced Courses
• Citizen Participation-by-Objectives (CPO): Discuss the pros and cons of Citizen Participation Techniques and learn how to identify the high priority Citizen Participation needs fora controversial project.
• Emotion, Outrage and Public Participation: Learn advanced strategies and behaviors to enhance quality public participation outcomes, even when communities are emotional or outraged.

Risk Communication Courses

• Basic Courses
  • Color-Coding: Going Beyond the Numbers: Explore color-coding, a visualization tool to help Agency staff present sampling data more effectively in this course.
  • Risk and Decision Making: Provide participants with an overview of the principles, policies, and limitations of the chronic human health risk assessment process used by EPA.
  • Risk Communication Training: Develop risk communication messages and determine effective methods and tools to convey these messages.
  • Risk Communication Training: Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced Principles and Techniques for Communicating Effectively About Environmental Issues: Participants will focus on the practical tools and skills needed for communicating effectively before, during, and after high stress, high concern, high stakes, controversial, and emotionally charged situations involving environmental risk issues.

Intermediate Courses
• Risk and Conventional Communications for Superfund Public Participation: Learn about the communication strategy and tactics for creating effective relationships with the public, listening to public concerns, and conveying information.
• Risk Communication: Messaging to Build Trust and Understanding: Learn insights and strategies for establishing trusting working relationships with communities and other interest groups.

• Advanced Courses
  • Advanced Risk Communication and Media Skills: Discuss message development techniques, preparing for media interviews, and media traps and pitfalls. With a focus on the development of message maps for use in media settings.
  • Master Class in Risk Communication and Cultural Diversity: Provides information on cross-cultural skills needed to be an effective risk and crisis communicator with a focus on symbols, signs, words, different cultural standards conversation, and different meanings of colors and images.
  • Risk and Public Negotiations – How to Communicate, Listen and Work with the Public: Provide insights and strategies for establishing trusting working relationships with communities and other interest groups.

Spokesperson and Presentation Courses

• Basic Courses
  • Defusing Hostile Situations – EPA Spokesperson Training: Learn how to prepare and handle conflict to make a significant difference in the outcome of a challenging meeting or encounter.
  • Know What to Say and How to Say It – Media/Spokesperson Training: Further enhance participants’ ability to explain their work and communicate tough issues through the media.
  • Mastering the Message – EPA Spokesperson Training: Participants will learn to identify, hone and deliver their messages in a team setting.
  • Pictures Speak 1,000 Words – EPA Video/Photography Training: Gain an understanding of what makes for an effective image, video or still photo and make the most of the equipment available.
  • Present Effectively in Any Situation: Learn how to effectively present complex or controversial information to key audiences.
  • Present Effectively with Style and Skill at Public Meetings – A Spokesperson Training: Gain the skills and confidence you need to “stand up and deliver” effectively during public meetings.
  • Stand and Deliver: Tips for Delivering Effective Presentations: Explore confidence building practices and learn how to come across as credibly as possible when presenting to the public, peers, and stakeholders.

• Intermediate Courses
  • Translating Environmental Science and Connecting People and Technology: Learn to more effectively communicate and connect with constituents, become more confident and comfortable speaking in public and enhance the ability to manage tough people and crowds.

• Advanced Courses
  • Fine-Tune Your Spokesperson Skills – Individual Spokesperson Training/Coaching: Enhance the spokesperson skills of participants to help them more effectively deliver key messages, even under pressure. This training is often coupled with other spokesperson training or is offered with a full day of training sessions in order remain cost-effective.

Writing Courses

• Basic Courses
  • Effective Writing for Superfund Staff: Community Involvement Plans (CIPs) and Beyond Webinar: Learn how to write clear, concise, and well-organized CIPs and other documents that help encourage community involvement. Links are provided to pre-recorded webinars.
  • Reader-Focused Writing (Basic) – Writing Made Easy, Reading Made Easy: Learn to use plain language and effective design techniques to create clear and usable documents for readers.
  
  Advanced Courses
  • Reader-Focused Writing (Advanced) – Writing Made Easy, Review Made Easy, Plain Language Made Easy: Enhance participants’ writing and review skills so they can analyze, write, rewrite, and reorganize clear, readerfocused material for their constituents.

Other Courses

• Basic Courses
  • Introduction to the Superfund Redevelopment Initiative (SRI) for Community Involvement Coordinators Webinar: Learn about the valuable ways reuse information informs and enhances EPA cleanups and how community development provides valuable benefits to EPA, communities and the environment.

You can also view the CIU Brochure (571KB/50pp/PDF), which was updated in January 2020.