Volunteer with EJAN
Environmental Justice Action Network (EJAN) volunteers handle individual cases. They provide critical information, expertise, and skills that are necessary to inform and win campaigns for environmental justice and climate justice. EJAN volunteers assist organizations and community groups that would not otherwise receive assistance.
We provide liability insurance coverage for volunteer attorneys on EJAN cases.
Are you new to this kind of volunteer work? We offer training!
EJAN provides training to facilitate effective, rewarding, and accountable partnerships between experts and community members. Training subjects can include establishing best practices for working with community groups, recognizing cultural and racial dynamics, and implementing a decision-making process with the group. An email blast goes out to our volunteer list once a training session is planned. If needed, EJAN experts can receive guidance from other volunteers or EJAN staff.
Interested in a specific topic? Email us your ideas ejan@ace-ej.org
Get Involved
We are seeking attorneys, licensed site professionals, planners, consultants, traffic specialists, scientists, and other environmental/public health professionals to support and empower community groups.
Volunteer Resources
These materials assist partnerships between community and scientists, lawyers, and other professionals.
Past Trainings & Events
General Community Engagement
Bias Interrupters Project
American Bar Association
Inclusive and Empathetic Language Use Guidelines
Alliance for Healthier Communities
Community Voice and Power Sharing Workbook
The Urban Institute
Community Engagement Can’t Be a Checklist
ShelterForce
Community Lawyering
Building Legal-Community Partnerships
Just Lead Washington
Community Lawyering – The Roles of Lawyers in the Social Justice Movement
Charles Elsesser, Florida Legal Services
Project Implicit
The IAT tests are anonymous complimentary tools that can be used to examine your own potential biases in many areas, such as, race, gender, ethnicity, overweight, age, religion, disability, and sexual orientation
Scientist-Community Partnerships
If you are a scientist, researcher, or someone who engages with data, we hope you find these resources valuable in your work and continue to push the boundaries of equitable, community-centered research.
Background Readings
Context, history, foundations.
Community Engagement Can’t Be a Checklist | Shelterforce – Essential Reporting on Affordable Housing
“The foundation for growth and impact in any community must be rooted in robust and inclusive community engagement as we strive to achieve racial, cultural, gender and other forms of equity. Engagement is—or should be—a process that happens with a community, not for or on their behalf. It requires time, deliberation and a sustained and thoughtful strategy to achieve transformation as we confront a myriad of intersecting challenges and aspirations.”
Scientist-Community Partnerships: Building Successful Collaborations
Union of Concerned Scientists
Guides
Instructions, tips, best practices.
Is a health study the answer for your community? A guide for making informed decisions | Boston University School of Public Health
“This Health Studies Guide is meant to assist community groups and individuals who think that some form of environmental health investigation or health study may be useful or necessary in their community. Readers of this guide may have environmental concerns such as drinking water contamination or concerns about a particular exposure that may be related to a health problem, such as the relation between emissions from a power plant and asthma in the community. People may suspect that a certain disease in their community, such as lupus, has an environmental cause or trigger. All of these may be reasons for wanting a health study.”
Inclusive and Empathetic Language Use Guidelines | Alliance for Healthier Communities
“Language is a powerful tool. The way we talk about people and communities facing barriers has a tremendous impact on the way they are viewed in our society. Words can either empower people and affirm the value of diversity and difference, or demean them and perpetuate the stigma they already face.”
Environmental & Health Guides | Statistics for Action
“These guides each provide a narrative overview of some aspect of environmental quality management. They can be useful for an organizer or community leader who wants a deeper understanding. Each guide steps you through a process, with advice about what to look out for, and how communities can be involved.”
Scientist-Community Partnerships: A Scientist’s Guide to Successful Collaboration
Union of Concerned Scientists
The Transformational Evaluation Relationship Scale II (TRES II) Reflection Framework
Indiana University Center for Service and Learning
Contains worksheets
Toolkits
Examples, templates, action.
Fostering Partnerships for Community Engagement
Urban Institute
“This toolkit is intended for researchers, policymakers, direct service providers, or technical assistance providers interested in finding and building relationships with partners to facilitate community-engaged work.”
Community-Engaged Surveys, From Research Design to Analysis and Dissemination
Urban Institute
“In this toolkit, you will learn how to implement community-engaged methods in survey research, with examples of projects from across the Urban Institute.
Community Toolbox
Frameworks for guiding, supporting and evaluating the work of community and system change.
Creating a Public Engagement Plan: An infographic tool to support the development of a meaningful, community-centered engagement project
Center for Advancing Research Impact in Society
Spectrum of Community Engagement to Ownership
Facilitating Power