Our largest crowd yet filled the Knoxville Center Mall's community room to capacity as over 60 activists, volunteers, and candidates turned out for Democracy for Tennessee's "Root Camp" grassroots campaign training seminar.

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There was an early-morning scramble to round up enough tables and chairs, but thanks to the efforts of Knox County Democratic Party Chairman Jim Gray and Democracy for Knoxville's Paul Witt, the seating crisis was averted! As usual, there was a brief presentation by DFT Chair Mark Naccarato on the people-powered progressive movement that Democracy for Tennessee is spreading across the Volunteer State. After that, it was time for our "Creating a Campaign" interactive workshop, where "Campers" learned about campaign themes and the types of messages that reinforce those themes. Campers then were introduced to our perennial fictitious candidate, Jane Smith, who is running in a nonpartisan Mayor's race against the uber-conservative incumbent Jack Jones in the Tennessee town of Stepford. Before long, Campers were laying out Jane's campaign theme and her positive platform to bring change to Stepford County.

After constructing Jane's campaign platform, it was time to figure out how to get the message out about Jane and her campaign. Our guest trainer, Jim Grinstead (pictured above), a veternan journalist, publisher, and public relations expert, led the "Read All About It!" workshop on communications and press relations. Thanks to Jim's expertise and real-life media experience, Campers now have a better idea on how to get free media for their candidate, issue, or event.

After the communications workshop, it was time for a working lunch session on "Crunching the Numbers". Freda Player, Outreach Director of the Tennessee Democratic Party (above), gave an a/v presentation that showed Campers how to analyze a voter data list, sort it along various geographic and demographic categories, and create a "walk list" for canvassing or phonebanking. She also talked about "scoring" candidates by political party, issue interests, or by their voting patterns. This was an invaluable tool in helping activists target the voters they are trying to reach.

Then came our "For the Cause" workshop, led by DFT's Field Director Georgia Weindling, which taught Campers how to manage the most valuable resource in any campaign... volunteers! It was a great 'How To' guide in making sure that campaign volunteers are used efficiently, are properly trained, and - most importantly - feel like they are appreciated and respected by the campaign and the candidates.

And then, as is the custom of all Root Camp programs put on by DFT, the day ended in a Door-to-Door Training and Roleplaying session. Here is where most of the day's skills pulled together as our Campers broke up into groups and practiced their door knocking skills by trying to get voters (the trainers) to support and vote for Jane Smith for Mayor. As always, this workshop was the most fun and our Campers learned alot about themselves and about how difficult it is to have genuine conversations at the doors of total strangers. In the end, all of the Trainers agreed that this was one of the best groups of canvassers so far in the Root Camp program.

After the workshops officially ended, we celebrated Georgia Weindling's birthday with chocolate cake and a rousing chorus of "Happy Birthday".

Then it was on to our special session, where local candidates found out about Democracy for Tennessee's Candidate Training School and about our endorsement process.

This was undoubtedly one of the most successful Camps to date and DFT's thanks goes out to all who attended Camp Knoxville! If you live in East Tennessee and want an even more intense and detailed grassroots training, make sure to sign up for the DFA Training Academy, coming to Asheville, North Carolina on May 6 & 7.