Join the Lived and Living Experience Advisory Group
Applications to the Lived and Living Experience Advisory Group (LLEAG) are now closed. Thanks to everyone for their interest in sharing their stories and making change. We will contact anyone who applied in the coming weeks.
What is the Lived and Living Experience Advisory Group?
LLEAG is a small group of people from across Newfoundland and Labrador with personal experience living with poverty and food insecurity. LLEAG Members have different backgrounds and experiences.
LLEAG is about valuing the knowledge you gain by living — the stuff you can’t learn from a book. It is a supportive and caring space where Members can learn and grow together.
The group uses their stories and experiences to advise on policies and programs through Food First NL and other community partners. You can often catch Members in the news sharing stories and solutions around poverty and food insecurity.
LLEAG Members care about ending poverty and food insecurity. They are passionate about topics like school food, basic income, and challenging corporate power and profits in the food sector. Members’ stories and experiences are a powerful form of knowledge that can create change in ways that facts and statistics cannot! This is true even when the issues are big and complex.
What does being a part of LLEAG look like?
As a LLEAG Member, you will:
Attend monthly meetings online that are about two hours long (Food First NL can help with access to meeting tech).
Participate for at least two years (we know life happens, so it’s okay if you have to leave early!)
Attend extra online training in Winter 2025
Work with media, decision-makers, and other organizations to address poverty and food insecurity (Members are not required to give media interviews)
Work with LLEAG to choose what the group will focus on and prioritize
Choose how much of your story or identity you want to share and with who. Respect for privacy and confidentiality is important.
How are Members supported?
As a LLEAG Member, you will:
Receive honorariums for participation in LLEAG ($50/hour, generally), just like how we would pay any other expert.
Have access to training, skills development, ongoing support, and other learning opportunities.
Receive any necessary equipment from Food First NL.
Have your travel, child care, and other participation expenses funded by Food First NL.
Be valued as part of a passionate, thoughtful, and equity-minded group that cares about one another and their communities.
Who is eligible to apply for Membership?
You can apply if you live in Newfoundland and Labrador and have personal experience living with poverty and food insecurity. You might be experiencing poverty and food insecurity now or in the past.
Ideal candidates are:
Committed to social justice.
Have experience with volunteering or advocacy. Your volunteer or advocacy experience can be formal or informal. Caring for your community and one another can happen in lots of ways!
Passionate about systems change and helping others.
We encourage applications from diverse applicants from all backgrounds. We recognize that people face different challenges that limit or prevent them from participating in conversations and decisions about poverty and food insecurity. These challenges are often caused by systemic discrimination based on gender, race and ethnicity, Indigeneity, ability, physical and mental health, age, and socio-economic status.
LLEAG is about bringing people together who have been left out of these important conservations and decisions. If you want to raise your voice about poverty and food insecurity, please apply! We will be glad to hear from you!
Please let us know if you need support with the application process. You can contact Laurel for support by email at laurel@foodfirstnl.ca or by calling (709) 200-3131.
What does it mean to experience poverty and food insecurity?
Applicants do not have to meet any specific criteria to be considered as a person with lived or living experience. This is because poverty and food insecurity look different for everyone experiencing it.
Food insecurity could mean:
Worrying that food will run out before having enough money to buy more.
Not being able to afford the amount and variety of foods needed to feel nourished.
Running out of food, skipping meals, or going days without eating.
Food insecurity is an income problem, not a food problem. People experiencing food insecurity don’t have enough money to afford the food they need. That’s why we typically talk about poverty and food insecurity together.
If you believe you could use your experiences to advise on policies and programs, we would love to hear from you.
How Do I Apply?
Applications are now closed. The application deadline was midnight on Sunday, November 10, 2024.
Thanks to everyone for their interest in sharing their stories and making change. We will contact anyone who applied in the coming weeks.
Contact Information
Contact Laurel with your questions, concerns, or accessibility requests.
Laurel Huget (she/her), Program Coordinator
laurel@foodfirstnl.ca
(709) 200-3131
