Speakers Bureau

Speakers Bureau Volunteers

The Speakers Bureau is an excellent way for University of Manitoba students in the JD, LLM, and Master of Human Rights programs to get practical experience in presenting to classrooms and delivering human rights-based education. The central concepts connecting all the Speakers Bureau presentations is human rights and it is a great way for students to gain experience in educating and advocating in a human rights context. Student volunteers will gain practical experience public speaking, responding to questions, and explaining ideas to an audience. 

Because the presentations are primarily delivered to grade-school classrooms they are a great opportunity for student volunteers to practice their plain language skills. Ready-for-use PowerPoints are provided to student volunteers and these presentations include detailed slides and notes with additional scripts. However, each class will be different and there is room for student volunteers to add some of their own ideas into the presentations.

Students can sign up for as many or few presentations as they are comfortable with. Generally, students will do 2-4 presentations over their volunteer period. Presentations are 30-60 minutes each and generally occur during regular school hours (8:30-3:30). When students sign-up, their availability will be collected. If volunteers arrange to present to a rural school, they may be reimbursed for milage if they promptly submit an expense form to the Center for Human Rights Research. 

After two presentations, students will be eligible to receive a standardized reference letter from the Speakers Bureau Coordinator and an Experience Credit from the University of Manitoba. This opportunity also provides students with great practical experience they can add to their resume and an opportunity to share their human-rights knowledge with grade-school students.

Presentations can be delivered alone if the student is comfortable with this. However, presenting in pairs or even small groups is encouraged.

The Speakers Bureau will generally reach out to teachers to arrange presentations and pair student volunteers with these presentations. However, if a volunteer knows a particular teacher and wishes to arrange a presentation directly with them, please keep the Speakers Bureau updated on the conversations and have the teacher fill in a request form when they know what topic and when they would like to receive the presentation. 

The Speakers Bureau is preparing to being presentations in January 2024 and will be accepting volunteers at any point throughout the winter 2024 term. When presentations are requested, the request will be sent to the email list and presentations are assigned on a first-come-first-serve basis. If you are interested in hearing more about this opportunity or being added to the email list, please reach out to chrrspk@umanitoba.ca. 

Questions?

If you are interested in hearing more about this opportunity or being added to the email list, please reach out. 

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