Urban Training Collaborative
The Urban Training Collaborative (UTC) is an initiative of Street Psalms made up of an organic network of local Hubs.
UTC Hubs share a common commitment to free leaders from all walks of life to love and serve through the power of the Incarnation. Hubs are independent, self-sustaining partners that provide contextual expressions of formation. The configuration of a Hub can take a variety of forms: organizations, centers, churches, agencies, for profit and non-profit, virtual and onsite. What they have in common is that they host cohorts or tables of leaders, in community, overtime, using the Street Psalms Framework to guide and gauge their work.
More Details about the Collaborative
UTC hubs put the city and the most vulnerable at the center of our concern. We want to unlock the capacity of individuals and organizations to love their city and seek its peace with the Gospel of Jesus. Unfortunately many leaders and organizations do not have a way of seeing, doing and being that frees them to seek the common good of their city and the most vulnerable.
In our rapidly changing, fragmenting and volatile world, what’s needed are not sectarian answers that drive us further into our siloes of difference. What’s needed are open and honest questions that call forth genuine community that leads to human flourishing. The UTC embodies this approach through our shared framework that asks questions.
Incarnational Framework
ll Hubs of the UTC share a common framework called the Incarnational framework. It supports the vision mentioned above in ways that honor our highly dispersed and diverse network. It functions as a diagnostic tool designed to help leaders and their organizations assess their freedom to love and serve. It does this by asking questions that are core to the human condition.
In the end, this framework calls forth what we call a “community in mission” that is free to create a world in which everyone belongs, especially the most vulnerable.
Learn more about the Framework
Framework Questions
- See. Does your way of seeing call you out of the myth of scarcity into the reality of abundance?
- Do. Does your way of doing call you out of theory into practice?
- Be. Does your way of being call you our of rivalry into peacemaking?
- Free. Does your way of seeing, doing and being call call forth a Community in Mission that is free to love and serve?
You can find more information about the Incarnational Framework including a more in-depth introduction to the questions as well as the full Guide and the findings from a recent evaluation here: https://streetpsalms.org/framework/
Membership in the Collaborative
Together, Hubs form a global network of mutual support for one another through virtual gatherings, site visits, joint funding and programmatic opportunities, as well as a Street Psalms Institute hosted in different cities within the collaborative.
Steps of Becoming a UTC Training Hub
While there are always nuances in the order of steps in the process of a Hub joining the UTC, the following steps are illustrative of the process. The list below is categorized into the three stages of Discovery, Pilot and Roll Out and is meant to be descriptive rather than prescriptive.
Step 1: Discovery
- A Leader in a particular city sends an email inquiry to Street Psalms (https://streetpsalms.org/connect/) expressing their interest in formal alignment as a UTC Hub.
- Street Psalms will establish regular calls with the potential Hub leader for relationship-building and to share vision/mission.
- The potential Hub leader will be invited to attend one of the UTC quarterly virtual gatherings with other UTC Hubs.
Step 2: Pilot
- A representative from Street Psalms will plan a site visit (virtual or in person) where a more in-depth overview of the UTC and Hubs is discussed.
- The potential Hub leader(s) will be invited to attend the Street Psalms Institute that is hosted in October every other year in a different city of the collaborative. (While this is not a required step for formal alignment as a UTC Hub, it is strongly encouraged when possible based on resources and timing.)
Step 3: Roll Out
- The Street Psalms representative that has been in relationship with the potential Hub makes a recommendation to Street Psalms that the new Hub and its respective leader(s) be formalized as a UTC Hub site with a signed MOU.
- If approved by Street Psalms, the MOU is signed by Street Psalms and the local partner organization.
Ongoing Evaluation of our Collective Impact
This is a learning community with a shared framework that asks questions. A posture of curiosity and learning is built into the ethos of the UTC, Hubs, and the evaluation of our collective impact. The questions and contextual answers that bubble up from local Hubs are core to how we assess our work so that we can share our learnings with the network and communities.
Evaluation is both quantitative and qualitative.
- The quantitative elements are meant to help both the Local Hub and the UTC understand our collective impact in cities where we serve.
- Key Data Collected Quarterly or Annually. For Example: Number of Cohorts Gathered, Number of Leaders in Cohorts, Total Budget of Hub.
- The qualitative elements focus on how the Incarnational Framework is coming alive in the Local Hub’s formation of leaders.
- Key Data Collected Annually: Are local leaders being freed up to love and serve? What are the stories of our collective work of freeing leaders? How are we applying the framework in our formation?
Watch the Hub Overview to learn more about Hubs, how to start one and why they are vital to the overall dream of cities of peace for all people where everyone belongs
*The Following is a series of four (4) videos, each of which is about 15 minutes. The total Hub Overview will take about 60 minutes to complete.
Additional Resource: Hub Inventory
Use this Hub Inventory to help you rate the health of your hub: