Schedule
Our Advisory Committee is comprised entirely of industry practitioners who have a demonstrated passion for public affairs and advocacy. The Advisory Committee will be tasked to challenge traditional thinking, to recommend topics and presenters that are at the leading edge of innovative advocacy, and to find featured speakers from outside our industry who can offer new and unique perspectives.
Opening Keynote: The New Media Playbook for Advocacy in Washington
Opening Remarks Cat Proulx (Beekeeper Group) The Washington media landscape is evolving as audiences, policymakers, and political insiders increasingly turn to trusted individual voices rather than traditional institutions for information and insight. In this session, award-winning political journalist Rachael Bade shares her perspective on the rise of new media and her own professional pivot within […]
Growing Good Grass: The Art of Cultivating Local Champions
As digital noise makes it harder to reach lawmakers through volume alone, the strategic cultivation of grasstops advocates is becoming one of the most important investments an advocacy team can make. This session explores how organizations are identifying, training, and engaging local champions — and how recent shifts in political strategy are reshaping the grasstops […]
Generative Engine Optimization (GEO): The New Earned Media
Search is changing, and so is the way your audiences, journalists, and even lawmakers encounter information. As AI-generated answers become a default source, organizations that understand generative engine optimization will have a major advantage in shaping the narrative around their issues.
The Coalition Calculus: Navigating Partnerships in a Volatile Political Environment
Coalition work has always required a blend of relationship instinct and strategic judgment, but the current political environment has raised the stakes on both. This session digs into the harder questions of partnership management: how to maintain productive alliances during political turmoil, when to disengage without burning bridges, and how to build political capital in […]
Lunchtime Speaker: Beyond the Field: The 30-Year Legacy of the Poet-Athlete
What started in 1994 as a small soccer team for 15 girls at Marie Reed Elementary has evolved into a city-wide movement, transforming thousands of "poet-athletes" across North America every year. Katrina Owens, Executive Director of DC SCORES, shares the organization’s journey from a grassroots experiment to a cornerstone of Washington, DC’s youth development landscape. […]
Trust as Strategy: The Art and Science of Organizational Credibility
Public trust in institutions is at historic lows. For advocacy organizations, credibility isn't just nice to have, it's the foundation of influence. This session explores how organizations can take a strategic, evidence-informed approach to building trust with skeptical audiences while also leaning on the relational, human side of credibility that no data point can replace.
The Science of the Prompt: AI Tools for Policy and Legislative Analysis
AI for advocacy continues to be an evolving topic, but for many teams AI tools have become an integral part of their workflow. For practitioners that are still wary, a lot of the confusion is in how to get quality outputs and understanding the 'what' of your overall ask. This session dives into the practical […]
The Art of the Nonpartisan Ask: GOTV Messaging in a Contentious Cycle
Midterm cycles bring a surge of civic energy, but for nonpartisan organizations, channeling that energy without crossing political lines is a creative challenge. This session explores how advocacy teams are crafting GOTV messaging that energizes their base while staying true to their nonpartisan positioning.
Networking Roundtable Discussions
The networking roundtable discussions allow for attendees to get to know each other by rotating through light hearted ice breaker conversation topics.
General Session: Advocacy Amplified
Join us for this special session on advocacy as we kick off our 10th year of the Buzz Advocacy Summit and our opening reception.