Skip to main content

LIPPI Session 7 was led by Debbie Lynangale of the The Mediation & Training Collaborative in Greenfield, MA. Debbie was joined by LIPPI Alumna Angelica Castro (Class of 2017) of Mount Holyoke College.  Angelica Castro is the Assistant Director of Community Engagement and Advisor for C.A.U.S.E., Creating Awareness and Unity for Social Equality, Mount Holyoke College’s umbrella student community service organization.

The Mediation & Training Collaborative, a program of Community Action (a current WFWM grantee) is a non-profit community mediation program dedicated to helping people resolve conflicts and increase their capacity for effective communication. They work with individuals, families, and community and business organizations to resolve conflicts and increase their capacity for effective communication, teamwork, and conflict resolution.

This month our LIPPIstas dived deep into a Conflict Resolution Workshop. What tools and tactics do you use in personal or professional situations to defuse or re-frame challenging obstacles to success? In an engaging and impassioned workshop, Debbie and Angelica led the group through strategies towards basic steps for working with conflict in professional and personal situations, explored ways to use those steps in helping others deal with conflict, and to explore dynamics of power and diversity within conflict solutions.

Throughout the training, participants drew on their own experiences to participate in discussions, skills-practice sessions, and role-play or other simulations of relevant scenarios.  By the end of the workshop, participants felt more confident and skilled in working with conflict that they will be able to use constructive approach to create satisfactory – and even sometimes transformative – outcomes to conflict.

The day concluded with an insightful debrief that gave us all the opportunity to voice our appreciations for the insights that were gained and how we intended on implementing those strategies outside of the classroom.

Thank you to Debbie of The Mediation and Training Collaborative, and Angelica of Mount Holyoke College for leading this powerful session.