The Neighborhood Leadership Academy connects resources at the University - Creating Whole Communities and University of Missouri Extension - with neighborhood leaders from across the state of Missouri to learn together through a virtual or in-person project-based curriculum, developing the skills and building the networks necessary to create healthy, vibrant and whole communities.

The Neighborhood Leadership Academy (NLA) provides in-depth and multifaceted leadership training that emphasizes community building principles and strategies, project planning, organizational leadership and management practices, and personal leadership skills.

Participants are actively involved in their neighborhoods and represent communities throughout Missouri. Academy participants may be neighborhood association members, community leaders, resident volunteers, community-based organization staff, business owners, local government staff, and municipal elected officials.

More than 400 neighborhood and organization leaders have participated in NLA, learning the skills and building the networks necessary to create whole communities. 

Through seminars, discussion, and personal community projects that apply tools and principles, participants will learn:

- Community building principles and strategies

- Personal leadership skills

- Project planning and implementation tools

- Organizational leadership and management practices

During the NLA, participants share and work on a community improvement project for their neighborhood. The following is a sample of their projects:

- Forming a neighborhood association to encourage more community involvement

- Proposing and implementing a community garden

- Developing a church-based community assets assessment

- Planning and obtaining funding for a neighborhood park

- Raising funds to endow a school-based youth cultural enrichment program

Participants who successfully complete the program will  receive a Certificate in Neighborhood Leadership from the Chancellor of the University of Missouri–St. Louis. Continuing Education Units are also available. 

FORMAT: For Missouri-wide residents: Residents across Missouri will attend the program in a hybrid format where sessions will be held virtually with some in-person sessions and events.

For St. Louis residents: St. Louis residents may choose to attend the program in the hybrid format with statewide participants OR fully in-person with other St. Louis residents.

REGISTRATION FEES: $325.00 (deadline: Wednesday, August 21 at 11:59pm)

Full & Partial Scholarships available!

SCHOLARSHIP DEADLINE: Thursday, August 1 at 11:59pm

Click here to apply: https://forms.gle/JT7eZ68jAyMijir46

St. Louis residents who would like to attend NLA fully in-person, please register here on this page. (20-person max. capacity)

  • The in-person sessions will take place on Tuesday nights from September 17-November 19

Missouri residents, including St. Louis residents, who would like to attend NLA in the virtual/hybrid format, please register here: https://cvent.me/OZva28.

Learn more here: http://cwc.umsl.edu/nla/

For questions, contact Tasnim Haq at TFHKTB@umsl.edu.

Partners:
UMSL CWC - Creating Whole Communities.