Education Programs

Learning at Coady

Coady Institute offers educational programming for emerging and established community leaders with a passion for social change. Coady’s approach to adult education is practice-focused and participatory, informed by learner-centered and asset-based methods that hold the potential for both personal growth and societal transformation. Courses are hosted on-campus at St. Francis Xavier University in Canada, off-campus in communities around the globe, and online using various communications platforms.

The following programs are open for registration:

Building Community Resilience in a Changing Climate

ONLINE. This course is designed for anyone interested in exploring climate change impacts at the community level and engaging in community resilience building – addressing injustice, (re)building relationships, and exploring solutions to the challenges of a changing climate.

Feminist Leadership for Capabilities, Ecology, and Transformation

ONLINE. In this 8-week course, we will focus on a political understanding of gender, power, and patriarchy in the current milieu.

Leadership for Young Professionals

ONLINE. This course will offer participants the chance to grow their understanding of what leadership means, explore their own personal strengths as leaders, learn new skills, and begin to think through how they can apply their leadership in the workplace.

Future of Work and Workers

ONLINE. This course will help participants better understand the magnitude and intensity of the current changes shaping the world of work and provide a peek into what is to come.

Grassroots Peacebuilding

ONLINE. This 8-week course is an introduction to peace and conflict while examining the nature, effectiveness, and challenges of grassroots peacebuilding.

Asset-Based and Community-Led Development Principles

ONLINE. This 8-week course introduces you to fundamental Asset-Based and Community-Led Development (ABCD) theories and principles.

Introduction to Community Peacebuilding

FOR CANADIAN APPLICANTS ONLY. This learning gathering offers an opportunity to strengthen, integrate, and reflect on the ideas, skills, and principles involved in building positive peace and what those ideas mean to participants personally and as peacebuilders in their communities.

Registration for the courses below have closed. We encourage you to check back regularly for future course offerings; we would be delighted to have you as a part of our upcoming programs.

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On-Site Programs

Katherine Fleming Women’s Leadership Course 2025

NEW PROGRAM! This 5-day course will guide you to identify and connect with your gifts and strengths, explore feminist movement building, while learning tools and frameworks that prioritize economic agency, justice, and inclusion.

Community Led Solutions for Climate Change

Human-induced climate change is the most pressing global issue of our time. How humans have historically lived, played, and dreamed is changing. The course will use case studies from different regions of the world and draw on the experiences of participants, facilitators, and local practitioners, activists, and community members.

Feminist Advocacy for Agency, Equity, and Justice

With pillars on feminism and advocacy, this three-week Certificate course will help participants deepen their understanding of feminism(s) and address issues of power, gender, and intersecting inequalities to plan and implement effective advocacy that strengthens community agency, participation, and voice.

Indigenous Women in Community Leadership

This program is grounded in relational practices and mentorship opportunities that will build upon your already trusted leadership capacities for community-led, community-driven development.

Livelihoods and Markets

This three-week certificate course will explore approaches that involve understanding the complexity of people’s livelihoods and the ‘market systems’ as well as solutions ranging from creating a more conducive and enabling environment, to an emphasis on trade and market access, small and micro-enterprise development, and innovations in climate smart/green technologies, and the application of various financial instruments.

Towards Decolonial Feminist Leadership

LOCATION: JRCT CAMPUS, DHARMSHALA, INDIA
This course aims to unpack both the concept and practice of leadership from the standpoint of power, intersectionality, patriarchy and inequalities.

Redevabilité sociale Stratégies et pratiques

Ce cours est conçu pour les praticiens provenant d’organisations de la société civile et de mouvements sociaux, ainsi que le personnel de gouvernements, des agences de développement ou du secteur privé, qui sont engagés dans les enjeux de gouvernance, de services publics, des droits de l’homme, de plaidoyer et/ou de la redevabilité.

Action Research for Citizen-led Change

This course will accompany you in identifying and undertaking research that engages citizens more fully from the outset in a spirit of co-learning.

Women’s Leadership for Community Development

This program will focus on recognizing and celebrating women’s strengths and gifts, assessing leadership models and approaches, exploring feminist movement building in solidarity with others, and include the sharing of tools and frameworks that prioritize justice, equity and inclusion.

Advancing Women’s Conflict Transformation and Peacebuilding for Community Development

This course is ideal for women who want to work collaboratively to transform conflicts and create an enabling environment for peace and development.

Online Programs

Leading with Abundance: Indigenous Women’s Leadership

ONLINE OFFERING This course will allow you to learn and explore the abundance of strengths and gifts that live within you and your community.

Participatory Project Planning and Management

ONLINE OFFERING This course will examine the key concepts of designing a project or program of action that cultivates positive social change.

Building on Abundance in Indigenous Communities

ONLINE OFFERING By the end of the course, you will identify changes you want to see in your community or organization and create an engagement plan to begin putting your plan into practice.

Adult Education and Learning for Community Development

Online Offering.You will have opportunities to reflect on your role and practice as an educator, explore theories and practices of adult learning, consider gender, power and learning for social change, and develop skills for designing adult education, including online learning.

Developmental Evaluation for Social Impact

Online Offering. Developmental Evaluation is an exciting approach to evaluation that enables social innovators, policy and program managers, and community leaders to design, monitor, and adapt social change initiatives in complex and uncertain environments.