Education, Training, & Information
Cooperatives are guided by a set of ideals, known as the Rochdale Principles. The fifth principle states that co-operative societies must provide education and training to their members and the public. The sixth principle states that cooperatives cooperate with each other, strengthening the cooperative movement by working together through local, national, regional and international structures.
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Here you'll find resources for businesses, cooperatives, and individuals in the Capital Region of New York and across the country.
NYC Network of Worker Cooperatives
The New York City Network of Worker Cooperatives (NYC NOWC) is the trade association for worker cooperative businesses in the NYC metropolitan region. They aim to increase public awareness of workplace democracy and improve business conditions for democratic, worker-owned businesses.
US Federation of Worker Cooperatives
USFWC is the national grassroots membership organization for worker cooperatives. Our mission is to build a thriving cooperative movement of stable, empowering jobs through worker-ownership. We advance worker-owned, -managed, and -governed workplaces through cooperative education, advocacy and development.
Cooperative Fund of the Northeast (fomerly Cooperative Fund of New England)
We work for economic, social, and racial justice by advancing community based, cooperative, and democratically owned or managed enterprises with a preference to assisting cooperatives in low-income communities by:
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Providing financial products at reasonable rates
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Developing business skills
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Offering an investment opportunity that promotes socially conscious enterprise
ICA seeks to change the nature of work by advancing businesses and institutions that center worker voice, grow worker wealth, and build worker power. We seek to create, promote, and support jobs, while collaborating with workers to define a truly entrepreneurial, democratic, and community-minded economy.
Legal and business consulting for mission-driven companies, social impact, and environmental enterprise. We are attorneys, we are cooperators, and we are social entrepreneurs. We walk the same path and wrestle with the same questions that you do. Based in Boulder, Colorado.
Sociocracy offers a decision making and governance model in line with the ethos of the cooperative identity, which honors and centers the human individual within the organization. As values-based and principle-driven socio-economic organizations, co-ops benefit from an operating system that has a coherence and a synergy with the Cooperative Identity. Sociocracy is an approach to decision making and organizational structuring that is relatively quick and easy for a co-op or start-up group to start using.
Resources for cooperatively owned businesses, those who are interested in starting or converting to co-ops,
and those wising to work with or support co-ops.
Resources for small business development and operation. Some of these are specifically for NY-based businesses while others are national or international.
CBC offers workshops and trainings to businesses, organizations and the public on worker cooperatives, cooperative principles, governance, and accounting.
Accounting technology advisors based in Albany, NY
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ABC is a worker-owned union cooperative dedicated to building solidarity economies. We develop the skills, systems, and confidence of people and projects working towards a just world beyond capitalism through bookkeeping, consulting, and financial education. Based in Brooklyn, NY.
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Albany Law School’s Community Economic Development Clinic
A free legal clinic that provides service to area nonprofit and for-profit businesses, and community groups engaged in influencing economic development. Note you’d like to speak with Todd on their Intake Form.
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Elizabeth L. Carter, Esq., LLC
A boutique law firm helping to democratize business capital and the securities legal space through accessible securities legal services to underrepresented entrepreneurs and legal training to lawyers and law students of color. The firm assists investment companies, emerging businesses, nonprofits, and cooperatives with the legal strategy and compliance of raising capital from their community of investors. We service clients throughout the U.S. with our main office located in Chicago, IL.
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New York Small Business Development Center
The New York Small Business Development Center (NYSBDC) provides small business owners and entrepreneurs in New York with the highest quality, confidential business counseling, training, and business research at no cost.
TechSoup equips changemakers with transformative technology solutions and skills they need to improve lives globally and locally. We do much more than offer discounts on the tools that you need.
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We are a proud worker cooperative, which means we are bookkeeper-owned and run. We are part of a movement for an economy which works for all, and which prioritizes people and planet over profit. Spanish-speaking. Based in Brooklyn, NY.
Individual Offerings
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General Introduction to Worker Cooperatives (1 hour including Q&A)
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Info: An introduction to worker cooperatives, cooperative principles, governance, and accounting intended for groups looking to get a basic understanding of what worker cooperatives are and how they function. The introduction can be tailored to specific industries and contexts or include additional information like worker cooperative history and the contemporary worker cooperative movement in the United States.
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More information to come!