As the national charity for non-religious people, we provide a number of services that require highly skilled people to put humanism into practice all around the country, in both in professional and voluntary capacities. We provide world-class training and our accreditation, once earned, is recognised as a marker of quality.
All of our training is exciting and engaging, rigorous, and of a high quality. We never expect anyone to walk into our training with all the skills, knowledge, and experience needed for the role, but we do expect participants to be reflective and adaptable in their approach when on the course.
As an applicant, you will be interviewed to let you know a bit more about the role you are training for, and for us to get to know you a bit better. At the end of each course a final assessment takes place before we award accreditation.
Once accredited, you will be able to work in your chosen area using the name, the quality assurance, and the marketing resources of Humanists UK.
Humanist Ceremonies
Our ceremonies training is currently divided into three ceremony types: funerals, weddings, and namings. Our training covers a comprehensive range of topics including how to structure a ceremony, how to build rapport in your first meeting, interviewing and writing techniques, and vocal and presentation skills.
Every ceremony you take as a celebrant will be unique, and the training will support you in finding your unique voice in this extremely rewarding area of work. On successful completion of the training, you will be part of the Humanist Ceremonies™ network, a supportive community of celebrants locally and nationally.
Non-religious pastoral support
We train and accredit individuals to become part of the Non-Religious Pastoral Support Network, which fields a mix of volunteers and paid professionals to hospitals, hospices, prisons, and universities around the UK. In each of the settings it is the organisation in which you work who will be your ’employer’, though our training supports you to approach the organisation for which you want to work.
Our induction training gives you insight into humanist pastoral care practice and how it operates in the very different environments of prisons and health care. Roleplays and practice pastoral care sessions are used in the course to help indicate to you, and to help us assess, whether you could be suitable to give this sort of care. On successful completion of the training, you will qualify as a member of the Non-religious Pastoral Support Network.
School speakers
Our school speaker training supports volunteers wishing to go into primary and secondary schools to talk to young people about humanism. Teachers often request a school speaker visit from Humanists UK via our website. Our speakers are equipped to offer classroom talks and Q&A sessions with students, deliver assemblies, take part in ‘multi-belief’ panel dialogue and ‘off-timetable’ days, and lend practical support and insight to teachers using our Understanding Humanism resources. School speakers bring a personal dimension to young people’s learning that goes beyond the textbook. Our training covers:
- Knowledge of how primary and secondary schools work today
- Information about good practice, guidelines for keeping safe in schools, and how to handle tricky questions
- Methods and resources to provide stimulating and engaging opportunities for children to learn
- How to advertise yourself to schools, coordinate promotion with other local volunteers, and build and maintain relationships with teachers and schools
Faith to Faithless
We know those leaving a religious group rely on a number of public and social services. We also know, from speaking to public sector organisations, that many service providers feel they need training to understand the needs of the ex-religious.
Working with apostates, Faith to Faithless has developed an in-depth training programme for organisations who may come into contact with apostates, including police forces, schools, universities, homeless shelters, social services, and local authorities.
Delivered in-house at your workplace, our training course typically lasts between half a day and a full day, depending on your needs. The training will be delivered by two experts in supporting apostates. We can also work with you to develop a tailor-made course for your organisation.
Our training covers:
- Awareness of the most common issues faced by apostates
- Referrals to relevant organisations that can help apostates
- Language and helpful/unhelpful ways to talk about apostasy
- Ways in which apostasy differs from some other forms of religious discrimination
- Safeguarding implications specific to your practice
If you are affected by these issues as an apostate, are part of an organisation who would like to access our apostate awareness training, or would like to volunteer to help us take on this work, please contact us at info@faithtofaithless.com.
Dialogue
As explained on our dialogue page, we welcome and support constructive dialogue between humanists and religious people. To do that, we have a growing dialogue network of people who are interested in being actively involved in dialogue in their local area, and who have successfully completed a one day online training course. Any member of Humanists UK can apply for the training. Just complete the Dialogue Training Application, or contact dialogue-officer@humanists.uk for more information.
Other training opportunities
Additionally, we provide training for a series of other, more specialist roles, including
- continuing professional development for teachers, tutors, and people working in roles where a knowledge of humanism would be helpful
- on ethics in business and industry
- on human rights and equality laws and freedom of religion or belief, often for government departments
…as well as a range of one-off and bespoke training types. Our highly skilled staff and activists will also sometimes provide valuable skills training to like-minded organisations.
If you are interested in any of these, or in receiving training from us more widely, please contact us for more information.
Thank you for your interest and we look forward to hearing from you soon.