I have been reaching out to many organizations and individuals that seem to align with my life goals and purpose through emails. That has not produced as much of an effective response as I would like. I soon plan to start calling organizations and individuals instead, as I feel I would make more of a lasting and effective impression.
I’m reaching out for advice on how I should go about enacting change at 16 years old.
I only have the ambition and drive when it comes to making a better society for everyone and I'm hoping it'll be utilized to its fullest extent.
Thanks very much for your important question, and apologies for our delay in getting back to you, as our Advisor has been on vacation.
We surely admire and applaud your ambitious goals, which if achieved could do no less than transform our society. We very much encourage you to pursue your goals and dreams. But we’re sure you realize that this may take a little while! So a key question as we see it is how should you begin.
We think it’s helpful to narrow your focus to something that you think you can actually accomplish with the resources (people, money, time) you have on hand.
It’s okay to start small, simply because you are more likely to actually get something done, and which you can feel good about. That small success will help keep you going. And it will draw more people to your work – if they see the actual success, they are more likely to want to be part of it and join you.
So set clear, realistic, specific, and measurable objectives. We recommend actually writing these down, as that will clarify your thoughts. Show them to others whose opinions you value, and ask for feedback. In any case, thoughtful and careful advance planning will surely help you here.
It will also be good to find other people to work together with you, as part of a core planning group. Working with a group can help you divide the tasks, which can naturally be considerable, and it will expose you to other people’s good ideas too. Your planning colleagues can support you, both practically and emotionally as well. And also, it’s generally more enjoyable to work together. (As an alternative, rather than form your own group, you can join or link up with a compatible group that exists already.)
In addition, as you proceed, you may profit from consulting some of the many resources in the Community Tool Box, in particular those chapters and sections on planning (in Chapter 8) and on starting an intervention (in Chapter 19) (See the Tool Box Table of Contents for details, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents.)
One final comment for now: When you say at the end of your note, ”I only have the ambition and drive…,” this to us is actually the most important thing you can have. Significant and lasting social change rarely occurs unless someone or some group really wants it, down deep, with every fiber of their being. So an important part of your task, we think, is to sustain that ambition and drive throughout your entire life. It’s one thing to have it at 16. But how can you design your life (if you want to) so that you’ll have the same ambition and drive at 26, or 46, or 66 and beyond?
We hope these starting thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you for writing to us, and all very best wishes for success as your work continues.
When thinking about enrolling in an online course, the first step is to decide what you want to study. That is, what kind of course you want to take? -- there are many choices available. And for an online course, the fact that you may live in Africa should not usually make much of a difference.
Once you’ve decided, then Step 2 would usually be researching online courses that are available in your chosen field. Here again, you are likely to find a wide variety of curricula, course goals, pre-requisites, formats, and costs. In Step 3, narrow your choice down to a few that seem to match up best with your own particular needs and circumstances. At that point, you may be ready to apply or enroll.
We hope these thoughts may be helpful to you. Best wishes for success as your studies continue.
I run a small family nonprofit. I help out with several community projects and the latest was 'Community Back to School Bash' in Columbia, MO. I would like to avoid people waiting for hours in line in the heat for backpacks, school supplies, food, sneakers, etc. There is the attitude that if people are receiving free goods, then this is the approach they have to tolerate. I know there's a better way to reach the needy in my community without long lines for an event. Do you know any practices/approaches that have worked? Also due to community partners, we can only have the event on a Friday during day time hours. I want to reach the 'working poor'. Is there a model out there that could be useful? I truly appreciate any insights! If you know of any planning software, that is useful for organizing community events, please include that. I would be willing to visit you in Lawrence if this is too much for an email. Many, Many, Thanks!!!!!
Thank you for your interesting and important question. We warmly welcome graduates of Mizzou, as well as all other comers. And contrary to what you might have heard, the streets of Lawrence are not paved with gold; we are learners ourselves.
While we have no definitive answers to provide, we can offer some possibilities you might consider and vary upon, depending on the specifics of your situation:
* A very simple suggestion is to ask potential recipients to arrive at different times. For example, “If your last name begins with ___, come at ___.” This involves self-selection and a willingness to follow simple guidelines, and the method is certainly not high-powered. But it may result in some improvement, possibly enough in this case. It also does not require any additional staffing, and any added effort on your part would likely be very minimal.
A more refined variation of the same idea is to use timed tickets. In this approach, each interested person would need to register by e-mail, text. or phone in advance; all registrants would then receive a confirmation with an assigned time when they would need to appear. This would probably do a better job of minimizing long lines, though it would require the recipient to provide contact information, as well as some staffing to contact recipients with their registration times.
As you may have experienced, this approach is sometimes used by museums and similar facilities for special exhibits or other exhibitions; you might contact them for details of how such timed procedures work in their settings. They would also likely know more about any relevant planning software than we do, though we suspect that for your situation as you describe it any complex planning software would not be needed.
* If the event must be held during the day on Friday (can this assumption be challenged?), when many of the intended recipients may need to work, could there be some kind of volunteer system, where designated volunteers pick up the back-to-school materials and deliver them to previously-registered recipients? These volunteers would resemble “neighborhood captains” or “block captains” for the occasion, and could receive some sort of special recognition. A possible advantage here is that these local leaders could perhaps be utilized in other community settings.
* If neither of these approaches are feasible, it might be possible to capitalize on the existing line itself by providing some activity during the wait. This could be live entertainment brought in for the occasion, or contests / raffles / giveaways of some kind, or (dare we say it) voter education or some related civic activity. In other words, to the extent possible, waiting in line could be reframed as a happy occasion rather than a heavy burden.
We hope some of these thoughts might stimulate your own thinking, and will lead you to responses that are both creative and effective. Thanks again for writing, and all best wishes for a magnificent school year ahead!
Thank you for your interesting and very significant question. We would suggest considering an approach where your students are involved both in forming the questions, and also in answering them.
More specifically, after providing some definition of what you mean by an ethnographic question, you could ask your students to formulate questions of particular interest to them. This could first be done individually, following which the students could share their questions with the class; or it could be done first by the class as a whole, if that seems more appropriate.
After initial formulation and presentation of questions, the class could then vote on those questions it would most like to pursue. For example, you could perhaps pursue the top 3-5 vote-getters, though the exact number could vary.
Then, after the top-ranked questions are selected, you could divide the class into smaller groups, with each group choosing one of the top-ranked questions to work on. After several weeks of in-class and/or out-of-class investigation, your students could then make their reports in class, including their responses to that question; that could be followed by class discussion. You could of course vary any of the specifics of this procedure to best fit the particular nature of your class.
(As a side point and brief digression, one question that could be asked might have to do with acceptance of Somalis and Somali culture by the larger White population, an issue I noticed personally on a visit to Pelican Rapids, a small town of about 3000 in the western part of the state.)
And as an additional feature, you could bring guests to class to speak to some of the student questions raised – or the students could seek out and recruit the guests themselves. For example, you or (better) they might invite Rep. Omar to your class during a future home visit (why not aim for the top?).
We hope that some of these thoughts might help stimulate of your own thinking. Thanks again for writing to us, and all best wishes for a wonderfully exciting and fulfilling school year ahead!
I am in the process of becoming a Certified Peer Support Specialist through the State of Washington Medicaid training program. I'm also in the process of developing my existing Natural Health Coach skills and volunteer services to also include being able to offer certified coaching support. I would like to have a focus and specialized training in trauma recovery. Do you know any resources that I might utilize? Is there online support for persons wanting to do such a thing and yet also need suport for their own trauma response being triggered when involved with this type of service to the community?
... We appreciate your question and the sentiments behind it. However, as our guidelines specify, our Ask an Advisor service deals with questions about doing work in the community, rather than mental health issues or personal counseling. So unfortunately your question lies beyond the range of what we are able to answer. We do wish you the best in your continued search.
Melody Heist
Tech For Troops
804-521-7979
Thank you for your question, and for the important work you do. Unfortunately, we do not keep or have direct access to the type of data you are looking for. We're reasonably sure they exist, though, and think your best bet for locating them would be through the VA system, either federal or statewide, or alternatively through the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development. Best wishes in finding what you need.
Thank you
Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box. We think you’ll understand that we have no knowledge of specific community resources in Huntington; but we can offer some comments on a more general systems level.
We think situations similar to the one you describe are found not only in Huntington, but also nationwide. And that suggests the desirability of having some standard protocol for dealing with them. Specifically, your clinic should have (1) an accurate and updated list of relevant resources in your area, with contact people and contact information, and also (2) standard policies and procedures for responding to people who present with multiple needs, such as the person you describe. How are needed services decided upon and arranged? And who decides and arranges them?
What might be your own role here? As a medical student on rotation, you presumably may not have a long-term commitment to this clinic. But you can help establish the resource listing above (#1), to the extent it might not exist already. And if it does, you can work toward establishing agreed-upon policies and procedures (#2 above), perhaps together with other clinic staff. By so doing, you could be making a lasting contribution, going beyond the help you might give to a single patient.
A next step after that would be for those standardized policies and procedures to be discussed, and, with modifications, adopted by all relevant local community agencies, so that the process for securing resources is clear and coordinated for all key resource providers in your community. You might also consider some evaluation of new procedures adopted, so that you and others could be guided by data on their effectiveness.
This is of course a larger endeavor, but perhaps worth considering together with other agency representatives, as part of an inter-agency team, if such a system is not already in place. Someone in your position could at least plant the seeds for its getting started.
We hope these thoughts may be useful to you. Thanks again for writing, and all best wishes as your important work proceeds.
I'm looking for a tool that will allow my team to audit policies for equity. I'm having a hard time understanding if something like this already exists.
Thanks
Nadia
A good place to start would be the website of the National Civic League, a comprehensive organization that reports on many different aspects of urban affairs.
More specifically, an introductory article on equity can be found at https://www.nationalcivicleague.org/racial-equity-tools-for-communities/, while a listing of different equity resources is at https://www.nationalcivicleague.org/equity-resources/
We hope these sources may be helpful to you. Thank you for writing us at the Community Tool Box, and all best wishes as your important work proceeds.
I’m a museum professional in the DC area and am doing research on community life and the role that museums and libraries play in sustaining and building community.
I’m searching for some information, a guide, or some chart or model that breaks down the parts of a community or the infrastructure of a community.
I hope that these questions make sense, and I appreciate the help.
Adam
Thank you for writing to us your question. To speak generally for a moment, we think it’s tremendously exciting to be a museum professional in your position, because there’s so much opportunity to make creative, significant, and lasting accomplishments in that role.
For us, and perhaps for you as well, a museum is not simply a place to display artifacts of the past, but rather a place that can analyze and celebrate the present, and consider the future of our society as well.
Perhaps at least as important is that the museum can and should be a gathering place where people can (hopefully) meet each other in person. The connections thus formed, both planned and unplanned, both formal and informal, can add up over time, with enduring consequences in strengthening community life.
Here's one of many examples expressing this general point of view: https://artmuseumteaching.com/2018/10/01/towards-a-more-community-centered-museum-part-3-defining-valuing-community/
We suspect you may know much of this already, in which case please take these comments as encouraging and validating your work.
As for an understanding of the nature of community, that’s of course a very big question, on which one could easily spend a lifetime of study.As we see it, understanding the community bears resemblance to the parable of the seven blind men and the elephant. Meaning that people will tend to view communities based on their particular backgrounds of experiences. So for example, politicians will see a community in political terms; economists in economic terms; demographers, criminologists, and educators from the perspective of their respective disciplines. All that is natural, and can be seen as good.
Here at the Community Tool Box many of us are community psychologists, this being a small subfield of psychology which focuses on applying principles of psychology to strengthen community life. So we tend to see communities through a psychological lens, and focus on such topics as civic participation, community problem solving, leadership training, conflict resolution, and community skill development.
One difference between our work and that of others is that we tend to deal more in things that are harder to measure. So, for instance, you can measure population in the community, or tax base or crime rate quite objectively and without great difficulty. But then consider your own neighborhood for example, and the sense of community you may feel within it. It’s important, but less easily measured. Yet as community psychologists, that’s what we try to do, and have in fact done with some success.
We cannot point to any single model or chart that puts all of these together. We do think it’s good to look at the community from many different perspectives, certainly including of course the perspectives of your potential audiences. In your museum work, if you can work together with those audiences in shaping future exhibits and activities, so much the better.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you again for writing – and all best wishes as your important work proceeds.
Rabinowitz, P. (n.d.). Section Five: Ethical Issues in Community
Interventions. Community Toolbox. Retrieved from
https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/analyze/choose-andadapt-community-interventions/ethical-issues/main
Thank you for writing to us. We appreciate your wanting to be sure of correct citation form. In this case, we would suggest:
Rabinowitz, P. (n.d.). Ethical issues in community interventions. Chapter 19, Section 5 in the Community Tool Box (https://ctb.ku.edu). Retrieved from [insert retrieval link and date].
Note that we have added a chapter number, and corrected the spelling of Community Tool Box (as vs. Community Toolbox).
We hope this is helpful to you. All best wishes as your studies continue.
Thank you for reaching out to us. Actually, we think you have already taken your first steps, just by stating your wish to re-invigorate your organization. That’s because without your intention, and your desire, nothing else can happen! So please give yourself credit for that.
Because we don’t know much about the sanitation problem in your particular community, or your past history of involvement, we are not able to offer specific detailed advice. But we can share some general thoughts for your consideration:
* First, take a fresh look at the problem you face. Since you may have been away from it for a while, you can look at it with fresh eyes. What are the key things that need doing, or the key actions that need to be taken?
* Then, given those actions, what might you actually be able to accomplish with the time you have available? There’s almost always something one can do. But how can you use your time most effectively? What you do could be small, and that’s okay, for that will give you a start, and serve as a building block for bigger steps.
* Since you mention lack of funding, you could act by joining an existing organization, whether public or private, as a volunteer. At the same time, you could also keep an eye out for funding opportunities that may exist now or are likely to exist in the future.
* Doing some research should also be valuable. Can you learn about what other communities have done when faced with a similar situation? And can you borrow or adapt some of their solutions in your own community?
* At around this point, it would be helpful as well to find a small group of others to work with you. Working together with others will help take some of the load off of you, give you ideas you might not otherwise have thought of, allow others to contribute their particular strengths, provide practical and emotional support, and also help build relationships, which can be satisfying in their own right. That adds up to many advantages.
There’s more involved of course, but we hope this will give you a start. In addition, some sections in the Community Toolbox may help you further, in particular the sections within Chapter 19, “Choosing and Planning Community Interventions.” Take a look if you can.
We hope these starting thoughts have been helpful to you. If you follow through, we think you will find the work both engaging and challenging. And you may be able to help create something that is both beneficial to others and to your community. We hope so! We wish you every success as your work proceeds.
Link to article https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Y7IAKnDuzC32gOYK8E3B_-IwYi8jPu1-OOGyNQsp8as/edit?usp=sharing
Thank you for reaching out to us and for your interesting question, as well as for your very engaging article. We surely agree that a strong sense of community is an asset to just about any organization, and while we do not claim expertise in crypto, we think this would apply to your organization as well.
Based on our experience and others’, we can identify several factors that help build a strong sense of community. These would include:
Leadership that prioritizes this factor
A long-term commitment to community creation
Repeated messaging along these lines
Structured opportunities for members to participate in the organization
Creating a feeling of shared interests – and beyond that, a spirit of
camaraderie and joie de vivre within the organization
Establishment of agreed-upon indicators to measure sense of community
A search for and emulation of successful models in your field
We hope this may serve as a start, though we can elaborate on these points and others on request. Thanks again for being in touch, and all best wishes as your work proceeds.
I have a at risk youth curriculum that I need to be researched. Do you have any resources available
Thank you for your question. We do not offer curricula for at-risk youth ourselves. But if we understand your question correctly, we can safely say that there is no shortage of such curricula that you can examine and draw upon.
One of many is produced by a well-established organization called ARISE, at https://at-riskyouth.org/pages/curriculum. We do not necessarily recommend or endorse it, but rather mention it as one of many that are available.
What we do offer are training curricula in general, for those wishing to improve their skills in doing community work. This curriculum takes the form of 16 separate curriculum modules (examples: Building Leadership; Analyzing Problems and Goals), each with its own participant guide and interactive activities. If you are interested, you can learn more at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/training-curriculum
We hope this information may be useful to you. Thanks again for writing, and all best wishes as your work proceeds.
Thank you for writing to us. It’s wonderful that you want to start a new group – we agree that social support is very important – and we think it’s definitely possible to do so. Congratulations on your motivation to do it.
We‘re not sure that funding in this case is necessary though. Many support groups come together and thrive without any funding at all. Actually, that’s probably true for most support groups; we have been members of such support groups ourselves.
If you can get together with people in your community who have the same interests and goals as you do, that may be most of what you need. (It’s generally helpful in these situations to work together with others.) Perhaps you could actually try this out, think together with some others about what might be possible, and see how it goes. You may find you can start the group just with the resources you already have. And once your group starts meeting, you may find that your group also has the resources to do educational and outreach activities at the same time.
However, you might decide that you want a group leader or facilitator with some experience in the field. In that case, you could contact a local organization that deals with addiction issues and see if they could find a staff person willing to donate time. Once a week sounds possible.
And if after consideration you decide that you did need some money for expenses (e.g., printing flyers), you might look for business sponsors who could make direct contributions or donate some of their services.
In addition, if you decided to apply for larger grant funding, the different sections in Chapter 42 of the Community Tool Box, on Getting Grants and Financial Resources, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/finances/grants-and-financial-resources, should give you a start.
We hope these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for being in touch, and all best wishes for success as your important work continues.
Thank you,
Sarah
Thank you for writing to us with your important question. Of course, we share your hope for the success of this project. Based on your note, the amount of money you want to raise is relatively small, so we are optimistic that you should be able to do this. Beyond that, we can offer some thoughts for your consideration:
First, in many instances this amount of money has in fact been raised for these types of causes by GoFundMe campaigns, so we think this should be a strong likelihood in your case. If you are having difficulty with the campaign, can you get advice from other successful campaigners, or even from GoFundMe itself?
Keep in mind that to raise 500 pounds, you really need only one relatively comfortable person who is sympathetic either (1) to you personally, (2) to your cause, (3) to preschool children, or (4) to Malawi. Who might you know who meets one or more of these criteria?
What about contacting, or meeting with a group of, other Malawians also living in the U.K., and asking for their ideas?
Or what about contacting relevant government offices (e.g., the British High Commission), not to ask for money directly, but rather for ideas?
Or might you be in personal touch with organizations that already support programs in Malawi, such as the Sparkle Foundation https://sparklemalawi.org/about-us/ ?
Can you produce one or more visual images (photo, slide show, or video) that you could show on social media (e.g., YouTube, TikTok, or Instagram), since visual images of children are often more compelling than words?
nd can you also take advantage of the approaching holiday season, which often stimulates generosity?
At the beginning of your note, however, you also mention that you are paying women to teach literacy and numeracy. The cost of doing this would of course add up to much more than 500 pounds over the long term, and we wonder about the source of those funds.
If you wanted to seek support for those costs as well. you might here consider writing a grant or other funding proposal. You can find some basic information on how to do this in the Community Tool Box, Chapter 42, Getting Grants and Financial Resources, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/finances/grants-and-financial-re....
We hope some of these thoughts may be useful to you. Thanks again for being in touch, and all very best wishes as your work continues.
Will be great if you advise on the best tools related to vulnerable communities' identification and need assessment to their needs
Thanks for writing to us with your question. We are not aware of any specific tool that helps to identify vulnerable communities. In a very real way, all communities are vulnerable, in the sense that they can be damaged either by internal forces or forces beyond their direct control. This suggests that communities should take steps to reduce their own vulnerabilities, and to strengthen their resilience. Note also that the same general principle holds true for individuals, and even for societies; the concept of vulnerability applies at many different levels of analysis.
However, some communities can probably be considered more vulnerable than others; this would most likely be determined in part by conventional social and economic indicators, such as income and education levels. These are internal factors. Other factors leading to vulnerability would include external environmental forces, such as natural disasters, recent conflicts with others, or other disruptive events affecting the community.
As for needs assessments, you can find information and guidance on conducting needs assessments in the many different sections of Chapter 3 of the Community Tool Box. Seehttps://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/assessment/assessing-community-needs-and-resources You might pay particular attention to Chapter 3, Section 7, on conducting needs assessment surveys.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Best wishes as your work continues.
We can certainly understand that this is a distressing situation for you and others, both in terms of your access to the bay and also of the social relationships in your community. How to resolve it? Based on what you have described, this clearly seems to be a legal issue, and one that would need to be resolved by the legal system, especially if prior discussions have failed. In this case, while keeping communication lines open, we would strongly suggest you and your neighbors consider getting legal representation and pursuing legal action.
Does your foundation have resources for special needs youth?
The Community Tool Box does not include specific resources for special needs youth, but there are many sites that do. We would recommend that you conduct a search on that specific topic. To get you started, you might consult https://www.care.com/c/10-helpful-special-needs-organizations, and follow the links given there. Best wishes in your search and in finding what you need.
Thank you for writing us with your question.
We think the best way to get started, with this or with most any similar project, is to find some quiet time with a notebook or keyboard and to think carefully and systematically about what you want to do before you take any specific action in the outside world.
In this case, among the key questions you’d want to ask and answer for yourself are:
- What are the specific goals of my project?
- What is it that I want to accomplish?
- How much time do I have to give to the work?
- Is there a deadline for completion?
- How much will the project cost? And how will it be paid for?
- Will you be doing the work by yourself, or will others be involved?
- If you want other people to work with you, how will you find and recruit them?
- As for faith-based groups, how will such a group be defined?
- What geographic range do you plan to cover – for example, your own city or town, or some other bigger or smaller area?
- Do you want to reach out to all such groups, or rather a sample? If a sample, how will it be chosen?
- Which person or persons in the group would you be reaching out to, and how would you go about it?
- ,Do you have a prior relationship with any of these groups, or would you be approaching them cold? (Use your relationships to increase buy-in.)
- In reaching out, what do you want to reach out to these groups for? What is your purpose? What do you want to ask of these groups?
- What would be your preferred data-collection method or methods (e.g., a single-person or group interview, a response on a survey, or something else?)
- “Health education” takes in a lot of territory. What particular aspects of health education are you concerned with?
These are examples of questions that typically arise in projects like this – definitely not just in your own. It’s true that there are a lot of these questions. But they are natural questions, and they are resolvable.
To resolve them, though, takes careful thought in advance; and we would emphasize that that would be time well spent. It will focus your energy and shape your actions when you actually get going, save you time in the long run, and result in better project outcomes.
We’d also emphasize that there’s no single way of executing a project such as the one you plan. The answer that’s best for you will depend upon your project goals, the resources you can bring to the project (mainly people, money, and time), and the nature of your target population. When you have gained clarity on these factors and on the other questions above, then your next actions will follow more easily.
in addition to these specific points, the Community Tool Box contains quite a bit of general material on interventions that you might want to consult. We’d recommend in particular Chapter 18, Deciding Where to Start, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/analyze/where-to-start, especially Section 1 within that chapter. The sections in Chapter 19, on interventions, should also be helpful.
We hope some of these thoughts will be useful for you as your work continues. Thanks again for contacting us, and all best wishes for a very successful project.
It’s excellent that you are thinking about these issues and seem so engaged in your work. As you may realize, you are asking several different questions in your note: (1) How can schools and communities work together? (2) How can follow-up to parent-teacher meetings best occur? and (3) How to start a community movement?
These are all big questions, and important questions too. We could write at length about all of them. But we think it would be hard for you to take on all of these questions at the same time, even though you may be young and full of problem-solving energy,
Instead, if you want to become more effective in your community and create desired change, it might be better to focus your energies on a particular question. Ask yourself “What, specifically, is it that I want to do?” Think carefully and planfully. Your plans will help guide your actions – and this will both help you become more focused in your work while also leading to better results.
In addition to these specific points, the Community Tool Box contains quite a bit of general material on interventions that you might want to consult. We’d recommend in particular Chapter 18, Deciding Where to Start, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/analyze/where-to-start, especially Section 1 within that chapter. The sections in Chapter 19, on interventions, should also be helpful.
We hope some of these thoughts will be useful for you as your studies continue. Thanks for contacting us, and all best wishes for a very successful community career!
The Community Tool Box has some materials that may be useful to you, if you’ve not had the chance to look at them already.
Specifically, you might take a look at the different sections in Chapter 1, “Our Model for Community Change and Improvement,” at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/overview/model-for-community-change-and-improvement, and especially Section 5 in that Chapter, “Our Evaluation Model,” at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/overview/model-for-community-cha....
You could also consult our sections on Evaluation itself, which are found in Chapters 36-39, and examine some additional resources simply by searching the Tool Box under “Evaluation Model.”
One more source with a different origin: Some years ago, many of our community psychology colleagues collaborated on a disaster recovery manual called “How to Help Your Community Recover from Disaster: A Manual for Planning and Action,” based on the best psychological knowledge at the time. It’s no longer new, having been published in 2010, but we think the basic concepts and processes still hold true and remain instructive. See for yourself at https://www.scra27.org/files/2114/0605/7122/SCRA_Disaster_Recovery_Manual.pdf.
We hope some of these sources might be helpful to you and your colleagues. Thanks for writing to us, and all best wishes to you and your group as your important work continues.
Thanks for writing to us, and for your question about using our materials. We appreciate your thoughtfulness here.
The Community Tool Box does in fact have a Use Policy, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/use-policy. It’s on a menu tab at the bottom of our home page, though granted one might have to look a bit for it. But as we understand your intended use, it would fall under paragraph #2 in that policy, which means you would be free to use and copy materials for non-commercial use within your internal workgroup.
Please do credit us when you use our materials. In this case, something like “Adapted from the Community Tool Box, https://ctb.ku.edu, by permission” should be fine.
We hope this is helpful to you. Thanks again for being in touch, and all best wishes for continued success in your important work.
Love what you are doing! I would like to know to be a peer parent advocate inlolved in supporting parents involved with child protection; What forms and templates would I need?
Further question I would also like to become a patient advocate and have the same questions about that.
Thank you
Thanks for being in touch with us. It’s excellent to know of your interest in becoming an advocate, whether it be for parents or patients, and we warmly applaud that.
At the Community Tool Box, we can offer some general background materials on Advocacy. These are found in Chapters 30-35 in our Table of Contents. We suggest you take a general look at the different sections within those chapters, and then focus on those that might interest you. Toolkit #10 in our table of contents, on Advocacy, may be useful to you as well.
However, we’re not able to provide you with particular forms or templates, largely because what you’d need would vary both with where you live and what particular group or organization you would like to get involved with. These differ widely, and will have their own policies, procedures, and documentation requirements.
We think your best bet would be to identify one or more settings in your geographic area where you might like to become involved. Then, learn about the most knowledgeable people in that setting (the “gatekeepers”), and inquire, perhaps by making a virtual or in-person appointment.
When you meet, describe your situation, and ask for advice and guidance. In that way, you can learn more about the local lay of the land, and what you’d need to do to get where you want to go.
We hope these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for being in touch, and all best wishes as you pursue your goals.
We ourselves do not have such resources, and our brief online search did not cover any relevant resources either. This leads us to suspect that such liability would be rare in actual practice and applicable only in unusual legal situations.
However, we don’t offer this as a definitive answer. If you feel motivated to pursue this question, we think it would be best to consult with others who have more legal background or knowledge than we do.
Thanks for your question about coalitions. We have been members, leaders, and researchers of many different community coalitions for several decades, and we cannot recall any coalition that has set itself up as a formal legal entity in order to protect the organizers.
Some coalitions, however, may seek legal non-profit status, or legal federal tax-exempt status for grant or funding purposes. (Note that non-profit and tax-exempt status are two different things, and that state laws on non-profits may vary.)
Beyond those situations, based upon on our experience we do not feel that such action is usually necessary. But if you feel special circumstances may apply in your case, you might consider consultation with legal professionals, who would have more legal expertise than we do.
Thank you for writing us with your important question.
Here’s a key point to consider: People are more likely to act when they think their action will bring them some benefit. So your job (and many others’ jobs too!) is to provide meaningful benefits for your clientele In your case, what might be the benefits of coming to the senior center? Based on our experience, and perhaps yours as well, those benefits could include opportunities to:
socialize with others, especially those like themselves
learn, through a short course or discussion
acquire new skills, such as in technology or food preparation
get practical information, such as on taxes or available benefits
express oneself, though art or music
exercise, as for example in a dance or yoga class
celebrate together, as on holidays or special occasions.
These are examples, common to many if not most senior groups. There are quite a few of them; chances are you can identify others, as well as some that are particular to local Hispanic culture and your own situation. Not all these activities will appeal to everyone, but all of them will appeal to some subgroup – that’s why most senior or community centers will offer a diversity of programs, with many different activities, so that there’s something for everyone.
If this analysis is true, then to keep your seniors coming to the center your task as a coordinator is to provide these benefits through your own programming. Of course, once you’ve established your program, you want to make sure that it is well-publicized, through the media outlets available to you, be they print or online, and probably both.
But there’s another step you can take to make your work most effective, and that is to make sure your programs are guided by the thinking and feedback from your target audience, namely Hispanic seniors. It should help to get their regular input on your current programs, and their suggestions for how they could be better. To ensure this, you could set up an advisory board (or some similar name) to help you plan programming and carry it out. In doing so, your advisory board members will also be filling a second important role, since they will also be ambassadors to the community in publicizing your programs,
In addition, there are general materials in the Community Tool Box that should be helpful to you and that you might want to consult. See in particular the different sections in Chapter 3, on Assessing Community Needs and Resources, and in Chapter 7, on Encouraging Involvement in Community Work.
But if you can remember and utilize the key principle of providing a variety of benefits that respond to community preference, that should keep you on a successful course. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for being in touch with us, and all best wishes for success as your important work continues.
Thanks for writing to us at the Community Tool Box with your challenging question. What you describe may seem like a difficult situation. But we seeat least two pieces of good news:
First, if it’s true few others in your center are not paying much attention to the issues you face, you may have a lot of freedom to act, and that can be good.
Secondly, and more importantly, you already have many of the resources you need, in the form of the other organizations themselves. They can do much of the needed work for you. Accordingly, your task is to leverage and channel these resources to produce good outcomes.
More specifically, in your situation we might proceed as follows:
* Identify the key resources
* Identify a key contact person for each resource
* Develop a simple form with that when filled out will provide key information about that resource (one page should do it) (Since you mention that a resource guide has not been updated for a learning time, here’s your chance to update it.)
* Get in touch with your contact people and ask them to fill in the form
* Collect the forms, with follow-ups as necessary.
* Compile the data into a resource directory. Since this will be online, additions and corrections can be made on a regular and ongoing basis. Send the directory to everyone who participated in creating it, and perhaps also to others who didn’t, with an upbeat message expressing optimism about what you all can do together.
Think of this as your “gift” to them. (And note that thoughtful advance planning and a one-step-at-a-time approach should keep you from feeling overwhelmed.)
When that much is done, you can move on to the issue of a shared referral system. You could invite people key representatives you choose to a meeting to explore what this might look like. Since you should already have built some good will through your directory project, participation on this task should come easier.
With some advance planning and strategic prior contacts, you might then create a task group to draft what such a system might look like. That group could bring its draft before the larger group for discussion, revision, and elaboration. Other steps will follow, but at this point you should be on your way.
In a nutshell: If you can keep in mind the key principle of utilizing and leveraging the resources you already have, that will help set you on a path toward successful community action. And we look forward to your success!
My name is Elizabeth Morgan. I have spent the last 2 years studying and researching impacts and treatment for trauma, PTSD, C-PTSD, with a focus on sexual abuse trauma. This is because one of my children, my daughter who turned 16 today) is a victim of sexual trauma from a family member.
I started college in 2008, and took many classes on psychology, and wrote most research papers with a focused and focus on mental health. Though I was unaware of what my daughter was going through until late November 2017, I have a significant amount of family members who struggle with mental health, and therefore I have always had a strong desire to understand their struggles as well as some withib myself. I am active duty Army National Guard, with nearly 14 years of service. I have an BS degree as well as an AA Degree in Organizational Management. My experience outside of personal research includes EMT, medical management, case coordinator, and about 5 years of training and operations of multiple small companies.
Since May 2020, my family and I have worked closely with the wrap around program in Indiana to focus on my daughter's recovery.
As the years pass and I see retirement quickly approaching, I am looking to get involved in my state and community and focus my career change in advocating awareness, making resources more known and readily available, and actively participating in policy change.
I have started by enrolling in FRIENDS Online Learning Courses for additional knowledge, but I am looking for guidance on getting actively involved.
I greatly appreciate your time, and I look forward to hearing from you. Thank you!
Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box. We applaud your interest and desire to get more involved in increasing awareness, promoting resources, and creating policy change. We think you’ll find no shortage of things to do!
We are not able to suggest specific contact people in the particular area where you live. But speaking generally, in your place we would take an inventory of what is currently being done in your area, and then reach out to the people who are doing it. You’d want to dialogue with them by whatever means seems most feasible – in-person if you can do it, or by e-mail or phone.
You’d describe your situation, background, and interests, and ask for their suggestions for your next steps. You could offer some volunteer time if you are able to do so, or explore paid opportunities if you are looking for those. Through these dialogues, you can better learn from those who are closest to the scene and actually doing the work.
We are confident that many of those you talk to will be glad to know about you, since it’s clear from your question that you have much to give in this area.
One more note, just FYI, is that the Community Tool Box has just developed a new online curriculum in community building that might be of interest to you. You could check it out at https://training.ctb.ku.edu.
We hope some of these thoughts might be useful to you. Thanks again for writing, and all best wishes as your investigation proceeds.
I am a public health planner with City of Austin-Austin Public Health, and wanted to know if you or others have access to consultants who assist with community health improvement plans (CHIP)? Any insight or direction would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you for being in touch with us. You might contact our colleague Susan Wolfe, at susanwolfeandassociates.com. (Web address: https://susanwolfeandassociates.com.)
Susan is an experienced and well-established consultant, and long-time colleague of ours, who works in this general field. She’s based on the Dallas -Fort Worth area.
Best wishes for continued success.
Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box. And congratulations on starting a nonprofit! We hope it turns out to be a great asset to your community, and a great experience for you personally.
You ask a number of good questions, and we’ll comment on each one briefly:
* We don’t think there is one single best way to start a workshop. It depends on who your audience is, and what they want to hear. But it’s good to design your workshop around your audience’s needs, both in terms of format (e.g., lecture vs. discussion) and content.
Some other points to consider: You’d want to think carefully about who should be teaching the workshop. You’d want to be clear on the workshop schedule – that is, the order of events. And you’d also want to pay close attention to publicizing the workshop, so that the people who you want to be there will in fact show up.
* Would asking your bank to sponsor the workshop be a good idea? Maybe: It depends on what you would want the sponsor to do -- for example, donate money to the housing community, or donate services, or something else. You probably want a sponsor to do something besides lending their name. If your bank can potentially provide what you need through their sponsorship, then most likely their sponsorship would in fact be a good idea.
* How do you propose the community center as the location? First, is that the location you want, as vs. others? If so, then you would want to check out the existing policies the center has for its use. These will of course vary from place to place. If your event fits with those policies, excellent. In any case, it’s likely to help to meet or talk with the community center staff, to go over workshop details and to begin developing a good relationship with them, if you don’t have one already.
A few more questions: Will there be some kind of follow-up to this workshop, so that you can learn the extent to which what was taught was put into practice? Do you plan on holding several other money management classes, or other life skills sessions? And what other workshops might you want to hold in the future?
All of these are natural questions, which frequently arise for new programs such as yours. They are definitely solvable questions, but in answering them you will definitely benefit from some thoughtful planning in advance, to help you make the best decisions for your situation. In addition, it’s good to talk to others to get their opinion, and, even better, to seek out people in other community settings who have done similar programs themselves, so that you can learn from their experience.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Congratulations once again: We send all best wishes for success.
My name is Sanjay Shrivastav and I am from India. During my research, I have landed this page. Well, first of all, I would like to thank you for providing some exceptional services for the communities.
I am looking for the best Community Software for the community management. And, I have reviewed following Google Searches.
1. https://www.g2.com/categories/online-community-management
2. https://www.softwareadvice.com/community/
3. https://www.capterra.com/community-software/
4. https://www.softwareworld.co/best-community-software/
Well, there are lots of options available and I am quite confused about. Could you please help me to know which online software would be the best option for community planning and development?
Thanks
Thank you for writing to us. We shared this question with a number of our own colleagues, who we thought might have more expertise in this particular area than we do. Their responses and recommendations were very diverse, and included Trello, Asana, Wrike, Soho Projects. Jira Software, Open Project, Freedcamp, Basecamp, InSpace, Figma, Padlet, and Canva, as well as Slack, Planner in Teams, Microsoft Project for the Web, and various Google products. While we can’t provide definitive recommendations ourselves, we hope these leads will be enough to help you in your own further investigations.
how many is too many visuals? and should visuals be placed throughout or at end of presentation?
Thank you for writing to us. Very generally speaking, PowerPoint presentations typically have no more than five lines on a slide, and no more than five words per line. Minimum font size should usually be at least 30. Visuals should be normally interspersed in your presentation. There are exceptions to all these guidelines, depending on your particular situation.
To answer your questions, and many more, may we refer you to two guides, both of which you can download freely online.
1. Basic Tasks for Creating a PowerPoint Presentation
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/basic-tasks-for-creating-a-powerpoint-presentation-efbbc1cd-c5f1-4264-b48e-c8a7b0334e36
contains a summary of basic key points, and
2. The Beginner’s Guide to Nailing Your Next PowerPoint
https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/powerpoint-presentation-guide
is more complex and detailed, with thoughts on putting more of your personality into the presentation.
There are a great many similar guides available, which you can find by a simple online search.
We hope these sources will be helpful to you. All best wishes with any presentations you may give.
Thank you for your question. The material in the Community Tool Box was published in different years (starting in about 1994), and was written by different authors. For an in-text citation for a school assignment, you could say “Community Tool Box website, various years.” You probably would want to include the Community Tool Box web address, https://ctb.ku.edu, in a reference list at the end.
If you were writing a more advanced research paper, your citation format would probably be different, depending on the field of study that the paper covered (e.g., humanities or science).
We hope this much will be helpful to you. Best wishes on your assignment!
Thank you for writing to us with your question. Each situation comes with its own details, so of course we’re not able to provide a full response to your question. But we can offer some general principles for your consideration:
First, disputes such as the one you describe are usually best resolved by dialogue. Legal action, no matter the outcome, is unlikely to resolve the underlying issues. Second, much of that dialogue should center around finding common ground.
What might that common ground consist of? In your case, some examples:
· * Wanting the community to be safe and secure, as evidenced by crime data
· * Wanting community members to feel safe and secure, based upon their perceptions
· * Ensuring that laws are followed
· * Wanting to treat all people respectfully
· * Wanting to treat all people fairly
· * Wanting to treat all people sensitively
This is not a finished list.
Then, how can that the common ground, once established, be implemented in practice? There are many possibilities here that the interested parties could explore together. Again, for example:
· * Agreement on the conditions under which the Blue Line Flag symbol could and could not be used
· * Agreement on the display of an alternate or parallel symbol representing the community’s values
· * Agreement on police procedures to be followed in certain designated situations; or, more specifically:
· * Agreement that caregivers other than the police should take lead responsibility in certain designated situations
· * A statement of the shared values of police and community
· * Training and/or educational programs for police and community members (e.g., around mental health issues)
· * A police-community review advisory board
· * A similar review board, with agreed-upon enforcement powers
A peace and justice group can certainly play a significant role in these discussions. For instance, it can advocate for continued collaborative dialogue, or for a particular solution. It can broker other possible solutions. Or if someone in your group is research-minded, he or she can research models that have worked in other communities, and which could be adopted or adapted to your own.
(We are also fans of Roger Fisher’s classic book Getting to Yes, which has many ideas you can draw upon, and we recommend it to you if you are not already familiar with its ideas. See especially the chapter on “Invent options for mutual gain.”)
We have no illusions that these kinds of discussions are easy. Further conflicts may surface. Strong emotions can become engaged. So it will help to gain prior commitment from those involved to stick with the process.
On the other hand, you can view the current disputes not simply as a polarized conflict, but as an opportunity for the community to come together and create better understandings and enduring agreements that will benefit everyone. Can you see ways in which you can take advantage of that opportunity?
We hope these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for being in touch, and all best wishes for successful resolution of your community’s issues.
The first thing we would say is don’t try to do all the work by yourself! It will help you to work together with others in the community who have lived there longer, and who know the community better than any newcomer could. You could join an existing group, or perhaps help create a new group or new initiative together with others. In either case, involving other local people in creating desired change is not only desirable, but almost always essential.
If Tusayan has few resources, it may also have many needs, perhaps more than you, or even a group, can work on at one time. This suggests four steps:
First, you want to clearly identify what those needs are. Sometimes they are immediately apparent and undoubtable; at other times, and at some point, you might consider conducting some form of survey or assessment of community members to learn more; this also has the advantage of encouraging and motivating people to join together with you.
Second, you want to identify the assets you have available, both currently and potentially. (By “assets” here, we generally mean people, money, and time.) Third, consider some actions you could take, on the basis of your needs and assets. And fourth, prioritize those actions, based on your own motivations and your perceived likelihood of reaching your goals.
Where do you begin? You might first aim to accomplish something modest at the beginning – something you have a good probability of achieving – to give yourself a feeling of success and some momentum going forward. From there you can plan just how you are going to reach that goal.
There’s much more to say, of course. But the Community Tool Box has many materials that can help you as your work continues. We’d recommend you take a look at the different sections in Chapter 19, on Choosing and Adapting Community Interventions, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/analyze/choose-and-adapt-community-interventions. You should also benefit from examining Tool Box materials in Chapter 3, Assessing Community Needs and Resources, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/assessment/assessing-community-needs-and-resources.
We hope these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for being in touch, and all best wishes for success as your project work continues.
I am a practising individual and couple’s therapist, been trained at NIMHANS, Bangalore India. I practice in New Delhi (the capital city of India) in private. I am originally from Srinagar, Kashmir – the northern part of India. Kashmir has been conflict areas and a historic bone of contention between two countries – India and Pakistan and since the inception of armed conflict in 1990s, the society has been showing all the signs of trauma and increased psychosomatic illnesses.
After Covid, there has been an alarming increase in divorces and relationship dissolution impacting families, children and society in general. The armed conflict has already left thousands of children orphan and now increasing rate of divorces are making the situation more worse. Since the valley doesn't have any expert trained to intervene at a grassroots level or at a community level, I have been contemplating developing an intervention model to work with the community.
As I am not trained in community psychology and work with couples only in therapeutic context, I was hoping if you could guide me in a direction about how to approach the issue. I am putting up few important questions as of now that I have in my mind:
1. How to approach the idea of community intervention in the context of relationship problems prevalent in the Kashmiri society?
2. What research and intervention models are appropriate to engage at community level?
3. What stakeholders within the society I should collaborate with in order to make a sustainable and effective interventions?
Thank you for writing to us with your compelling question. We applaud your interest in this important issue and your motivation to take action on it to reduce the problem.
Before responding to your specific questions, there are two questions we’d like to ask you.
The first question is one of time. How much time are you willing to devote to this work? We ask because it would certainly be possible to devote a full professional lifetime to this issue. It doesn’t sound as though you want to do that, but the amount of time you can spend will help determine both your strategy and your results.
The second question is one of geography. Since Kashmir is many hundreds of miles from where you are based in New Delhi, how would an intervention work in practice? Would you propose to direct it remotely? Or do you see your main contribution as simply creating a model for how such an intervention would work?
Putting those issues aside for the moment, and focusing on the three questions you ask:
1. There are principles that apply to interventions in general, whether they be in Kashmiri society, in community psychology, in behavioral science in general, or in group and organizational life, regardless of context or discipline.
More specifically in your case (and in many others). you would want to establish a general goal for your work, and state quite precisely what you would like to accomplish.
You would designate a target area or community where you propose the work would take place.\
And you would make contact with the key stakeholders in your target area or community, to learn about more about their perception of the issue, and about their potential willingness to work together with you and others to reduce the problem. More on this in a moment.
Whether or not you are personally on the scene, it will help to have a core group of people who will be involved in the work. You’d want to draw on them for their ideas, their actions, and also their emotional support as you proceed. You’d want to leverage their talents and abilities to get maximum value from their involvement. Together, you’d want to plan the particular actions you can and should take, depending on your understanding of the needs and resources available. All this will take some time, but it will have been time well spent.
These are basic components of any intervention. They are not fancy, or difficult to grasp. But specifying the details does take thought, and the execution does take work.
2. As for research and intervention models, we are sure there are many. At the risk of self-promotion, we would encourage you to take a look at our own. It is called Our Model of Practice for Community Change and Improvement, and can be found in Chapter 1, Section 3 of the Community Tool Box,
https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/overview/model-for-community-change-and-improvement/building-capacity/main
3. As for stakeholders, a common starting point is to begin with the major social institutions in your target area. As we are not Kashmiri, you would know these better than we do. But what comes first to our mind are the religious institutions in the area, such as mosques and temples. Also, the educational institutions, in particular colleges and universities. Others might include some people in the business community, the local media, counselors, nonprofits, politicians, and possibly others without any particular affiliation. Others you know personally might also be good sources of recommendation.
If you make contacts, some people you contact will be interested in what you are suggesting, others will not be. That is natural; one would simply work with those who are interested.
(In addition to the thoughts here, we think you might benefit from exploring some of the many other materials in the Community Tool Box -- perhaps especially the different sections in Chapter 19, on Choosing and Adapting Community Interventions, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/analyze/choose-and-adapt-community-interventions.)
We’ll close by offering an idea on one of the many possible directions you could take, keeping in mind this is just our own opinion, and we are outsiders
In your place, we would want to develop an intervention that would have the greatest impact on the greatest number of people. So we would envision some kind of educational program, such as a webinar, or even better a webinar series. or training curriculum, that could attract a significant professional audience. Or perhaps even better, an educational program that could reach a mass audience over their smartphones, that would be lively, catchy, frank, instructive, with some humor and attractive graphics, with real people doing role plays, or animated characters dramatizing the content you want to get across.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you again for writing to us. We hope you will have the chance to implement your ideas, and to make a positive difference in your home community. We wish you the very best in doing so.
Thank you!
Kelly
Thank you for writing to us. If you are using American Psychological Association [APA] style, a suggested generic format for citing Community Toolbox materials would be:
Community Toolbox (n.d.). Chapter [insert number of the chapter], Section [insert number of the section], [insert title of section, in italics]. Retrieved from https://ctb.ku.edu, [insert date of your retrieval].
To put this in the form of a specific example, if you were citing Chapter 4, Section 2 today (this section is chosen at random), your citation would look like:
Community Toolbox (n.d.). Chapter 4, Section 2, Communicating information about community health and development issues. Retrieved from https://ctb.ku.edu, February 13, 2023. (FYI, the “n.d.” in both cases above indicates that no date of publication was cited in the original source.)
Additional style format guidance is given in the APA Publication Manual.
We hope this is useful to you, and send best wishes for success in your project.
Thank you for writing to us. If you are using American Psychological Association [APA] style, a suggested generic format for citing Community Toolbox materials would be:
Community Toolbox (n.d.). Chapter [insert number of the chapter], Section [insert number of the section], [insert title of section, in italics]. Retrieved from https://ctb.ku.edu, [insert date of your retrieval].
To put this in the form of a specific example, if you were citing Chapter 4, Section 2 today (this section is chosen at random), your citation would look like:
Community Toolbox (n.d.). Chapter 4, Section 2, Communicating information about community health and development issues. Retrieved from https://ctb.ku.edu, February 24, 2023.
(FYI, the “n.d.” in both cases above indicates that no date of publication was cited in the original source.)
Our own practice is to cite the Community Tool Box itself as the author, since almost all of what we publish is a group effort.
You can find additional style format guidance in the APA Publication Manual.
Thanks again for writing; we hope this is useful to you.
I have a couple of questions:
How to integrate first year international students in the university community?
How to prevent them from having psychology difficulties in their academic journey?
How to rise awareness regarding the problem?
What activities should be done regarding the issue?
Thank you in advance!
Kind regards,
Velina Parashkevova
Thanks for writing to us at the Community Tool Box with your important question. We understand the situation you describe, and in our experience it applies to many other student housing situations in different countries. It’s very natural to feel isolated and alone in those situations.
But there are many ways this situation can be improved. For example
Establishing a physical meeting space where new students, and especially foreign students, can come together, either on or off campus
Establishing a special website and social media channels for these students
Developing a “buddy system,” where a new student is paired with a returning student from the same country or locale, to help the new student adjust to school
Developing a strong orientation program for new students when they arrive, and even before they arrive at the beginning of the school year
Developing a program of planned activities throughout the school year for those students
Creating a student-led advisory board or similar groups to help plan activities and programs
Designating a staff coordinator for these services, paid for by the school -- that is, the school should invest some of its financial resources for this purpose.
Ensuring that sufficient transportation opportunities are available, so that students can easily get back and forth from campus
Ensuring that counseling services are available for students experiencing academic or emotional problems, or just seeking an opportunity to talk
Collecting evaluation data on programs that are offered, so that new programs are based upon stated need and previous positive feedback
Learning from other schools who have had successes in this area, and adopting or adapting their ideas. In other words, what are the best models or practices in the field?
(There are many sources for such models and practices. For example, try a simple internet search for “welcoming new students to college,” or “welcoming foreign students to college,” and examine some of the sources you find.)
Creating more on-campus housing options, of course
In these recommendations, we can also identify some of the underlying change principles that seem important for success:
Establishing an organizational structure through which desired changes can take place
Having a long-term commitment
Investing resources into the effort – both people, money, and time
Spending time to plan these activities in advance
Basing planning decisions on past evaluation data
Generating participation by those affected
These principles, which are based in psychology, will also apply in many other change settings. When they are operative, desired change is more likely.
We should also mention that some other students in your class, such as Presiansa, Brigena, and Mihail, wrote us with a similar question, and you might want to coordinate your work with theirs.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you.All best wishes for success in your project work and beyond.
Thank you!
Thanks for writing to us at the Community Tool Box with your important question. We understand the situation you describe, and in our experience it applies to many other student housing situations in different countries. It’s very natural to feel isolated and alone in those situations.
But there are many ways this situation can be improved. For example:
Establishing a physical meeting space where new students, and especially foreign students, can come together, either on or off campus
Establishing a special website and social media channels for these students
Developing a “buddy system,” where a new student is paired with a returning student from the same country or locale, to help the new student adjust to school
Developing a strong orientation program for new students when they arrive, and even before they arrive at the beginning of the school year
Developing a program of planned activities throughout the school year for those students
Creating a student-led advisory board or similar groups to help plan activities and programs
Designating a staff coordinator for these services, paid for by the school -- that is, the school should invest some of its financial resources for this purpose.
Ensuring that sufficient transportation opportunities are available, so that students can easily get back and forth from campus
Ensuring that counseling services are available for students experiencing academic or emotional problems, or just seeking an opportunity to talk
Collecting evaluation data on programs that are offered, so that new programs are based upon stated need and previous positive feedback
Learning from other schools who have had successes in this area, and adopting or adapting their ideas. In other words, what are the best models or practices in the field?
(There are many sources for such models and practices. For example, try a simple internet search for “welcoming new students to college,” or “welcoming foreign students to college,” and examine some of the sources you find.)
Creating more on-campus housing options, of course
In these recommendations, we can also identify some of the underlying change principles that seem important for success:
Establishing an organizational structure through which desired changes can take place
Having a long-term commitment
Investing resources into the effort – both people, money, and time
Spending time to plan these activities in advance
Basing planning decisions on past evaluation data
Generating participation by those affected
These principles, which are based in psychology, will also apply in many other change settings. When they are operative, desired change is more likely.
Is there an opposing side to this issue? We have a hard time imagining one. Policy recommendations may differ, but we think just about everyone wants new or international students to have a positive experience when they are at school.
We should also mention that some other students in your class, such as Presiana, Brigena, and Mihail, wrote us with a similar question, and you might want to coordinate your work with theirs.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. All best wishes for success in your project work and beyond.
And please say hello to Prof. Harvey!
We are open to any suggestions on how we could make the students living off campus feel a part of the university and how we could help the university to tackle the issue. Any links/research done on this matter would be very helpful because we could not find much online. Probable topics we discussed are reflection on mental health, possible solutions, and cases from abroad where this situation occurred.
Thank you for your time! :)
Thanks for writing to us at the Community Tool Box with your important question. We understand the situation you describe, and in our experience it applies to many other student housing situations in different countries. It’s very natural to feel isolated and alone in those situations.
But there are many ways this situation can be improved. For example
Establishing a physical meeting space where new students, and especially foreign students, can come together, either on or off campus
Establishing a special website and social media channels for these students
Developing a “buddy system,” where a new student is paired with a returning student from the same country or locale, to help the new student adjust to school
Developing a strong orientation program for new students when they arrive, and even before they arrive at the beginning of the school year
Developing a program of planned activities throughout the school year for those students
Creating a student-led advisory board or similar groups to help plan activities and programs
Designating a staff coordinator for these services, paid for by the school -- that is, the school should invest some of its financial resources for this purpose.
Ensuring that sufficient transportation opportunities are available, so that students can easily get back and forth from campus
Ensuring that counseling services are available for students experiencing academic or emotional problems, or just seeking an opportunity to talk
Collecting evaluation data on programs that are offered, so that new programs are based upon stated need and previous positive feedback
Learning from other schools who have had successes in this area, and adopting or adapting their ideas. In other words, what are the best models or practices in the field?
(There are many sources for such models and practices. For example, try a simple internet search for “welcoming new students to college,” or “welcoming foreign students to college,” and examine some of the sources you find.)
Creating more on-campus housing options, of course
In these recommendations, we can also identify some of the underlying change principles that seem important for success:
Establishing an organizational structure through which desired changes can take place
Having a long-term commitment
Investing resources into the effort – both people, money, and time
Spending time to plan these activities in advance
Basing planning decisions on past evaluation data
Generating participation by those affected
These principles, which are based in psychology, will also apply in many other change settings. When they are operative, desired change is more likely.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you.All best wishes for success in your project work and beyond.
And please say hello to Prof. Harvey!
My teammates and I are working on a project for a Psychology of Social Change course with Prof. Ronald Harvey at the American University in Bulgaria. We are currently focused on a social problem that concerns mental health. We were thinking of exploring why people do not seek outside/professional help when needed. Our focus is Bulgaria, but we think that in the Balkan region, the case is similar. What we believe is the most 'troublesome' group is older men. In Bulgaria, the older generation does not seem to accept well the idea of going to therapy. This might be because of fear of shame. They tend to keep the problems to themselves, and/or friends and family. We currently haven't found any scholarly sources on this issue. Do you think you could maybe forward us some sources and studies that contain interesting information about the case?
Thank you in advance!
Best regards,
Viktoriya Ikonomova
Thanks for writing to us at the Community Tool Box with your important question.
It’s definitely worthwhile to investigate why some people are resistant to therapy, and to ask what might be the conditions under which people would be more accepting of therapy.
As you proceed, though, we think it will be useful for you to check your assumptions: Is it in fact true that older men are more resistant to therapy, either in Bulgaria or elsewhere? What is the factual evidence that supports this?
If you need or desire more evidence, can you talk to current mental health providers to learn more? What do they think? Do they know of previous studies that have been done on the topic in Bulgaria, or of previous surveys that have been taken? If not, would it be possible to design your own study, even though to carry it out might take longer than you have the time for in your class?
Also, is there a way you could test your hypothesis of shame as a cause of resistance, as vs. other factors?
In describing resistance, it may also help you to consider what is meant by “therapy.” Perhaps it does not have to be provided by trained professionals. For example, a recent example from Zimbabwe, in Africa, used ordinary grandmothers, who were trained to sit outside on ‘friendship benches” in their town and make themselves available to people who wanted to sit down and talk.
This seemed to be effective there. Was it “therapy?” Perhaps. If so, what might work for older men in Bulgaria? Maybe it might have to do with providing discussion opportunities in places where older men naturally go, such as bars, coffee shops, social clubs, or other gathering places. The needed work could take place within a discussion group, even though you might not label it as "therapy" as such. But it could accomplish the same purpose.
Some creativity might be called for. Would this be effective? It’s hard to say, but the idea could be tested. You might find other examples through your own literature search of the field.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. All best wishes for success in your project work and beyond. And please say hello to Prof. Harvey!
How should each individual or organization be involved?
2.) There has been an increase in heroin use in a metropolitan area. The local government needs a solution. Who will be involved in coming up with a plan? Who should be involved in this scenario?
How should each individual or organization be involved?
3.)The number of people who are homeless in urban areas has increased by 15% in the last two years. Citizens are concerned and complaining to the city government. Who will be involved to address the issue? Who should be involved in this scenario?
How should each individual or organization be involved?
Thank you for writing to us with your thought-provoking questions.
In our view, all sectors of the community can be involved in all three of the scenarios you pose. That includes residents, community groups, and government at both local, state, and federal levels. In general, The greater the extent and the diversity of the involvement, more beneficial the outcome is likely to be.
Whether each sector should be involved is a different question. The answer here depends on the formal or mandated responsibility of the sector and the importance of the problem relative to other problems the sector may be responsible for.
In the case of the walking path, resident involvement seems especially important. Such a path is not usually seen as an essential public service, which suggests that residents will have to advocate for it and work toward getting community agreement on the length of the path, the route it will take, its design features (width, composition, signage, etc.), the conditions of use, and how much it might cost.
Residents promoting the path will probably do better if they organize into a group, and work to obtain broader community and local government backing through (for example) holding public hearings or making personal contacts with decision makers.
The cases of heroin use and homelessness are somewhat different, in that more specialized knowledge is usually required (such as how to treat heroin addiction, etc.). In addition, larger amounts of funding are usually called for, and funding typically needs to be continued over years, as contrasted with a one-time expense for the walking path.
Accordingly, governments here would usually take on a greater share of the responsibility. And most might agree that it is government’s job to be the primary provider of services. Nevertheless, in both those cases., resident involvement is desirable and should be solicited, especially from the residents most directly impacted by the situation (such as heroin users and homeless people).
For further information and ideas, you might benefit from looking at some of the materials in the Community Tool Box, especially the sections in Chapter 18 and 24, on involving different community sectors. You can find links to these in the Community Tool Box table of contents.
In sum, a good rule of thumb is to encourage the greatest degree of involvement from the largest feasible number of different groups in the community, and especially from those who are most affected by the problem.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for writing to us, and all best wishes for success as your work continues.
Thank you for writing to us. If we understand your question correctly, the basic materials in the Community Tool Box, such as the how-to-do-it sections in the table of contents, as well as the toolkits, are always free and downloadable by anyone at any time. You can visit https://ctb.ku.edu for details.
Some of the services the Community Tool Box provides, though, such as the Workstations you mention and our new online training program on Building Healthy Communities, do involve cost. Price information in each case can be found at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/services, and also at https://training.ctb.ku.edu
We hope this Information is useful to you, and that you will be able to benefit from what we have to offer.
Thank you in advance.
Thank you for writing to us with your question. Our first recommendation would be to narrow down your topic. That is because drug and alcohol prevention is a very big topic. You could easily spend years learning all there is to know about it, more time than you have for this course project.
Instead, you could ask “What is it about this topic that I want to learn?” and “What specific questions do I have?” Asking these questions should help lead you to a research topic that you can handle within the course time you have available.
Doing so will also help you find the sources that are most relevant to your question. Since we don’t yet know what your questions are, we cannot be specific. But one good place to start might be https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/prevention. Since you are writing to us here in the U.S. we are most familiar with U.S. sources, and this is one of the best ones. It comes from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, which is the U.S. federal agency that is responsible for drug and alcohol prevention.
Check it out if you are able. This site also links to many other sources that might be of interest to you. Much of what you find there should also be relevant to Bulgaria, though we are sure you can also find many other sources that are more directly relevant to your own country.
We hope these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for writing, and all best wishes for a successful project as your research continues.
You can find a great deal of information about designing a plan in the Community Tool Box. See in particular Chapter 8, Section 5 on Action Planning, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/structure/strategic-planning/develop-action-plans/main, and the other sections in Chapter 8 on planning more generally. There is also a toolkit on planning that accompanies these materials.
We think these resources will help you in your task, and we send you best wishes for success.
You can find a great deal of information about designing a plan in the Community Tool Box. See in particular Chapter 8, Section 5 on Action Planning, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/structure/strategic-planning/develop-action-plans/main, and the other sections in Chapter 8 on planning more generally. There is also a toolkit on planning that accompanies these materials.
We think these resources will help you in your task, and we send you best wishes for success.
My question is, would evaluating a professional association such as of rural health professionals, follow the same principles of evaluating a coalition or an issue-based initiative? I know most of their efforts are put toward advocacy, networking, and education if that is helpful for context.
The short answer to your question is “Yes,” and this would be the basis for a longer answer as well.
The basic idea in almost all evaluation situations is to agree upon the indicators that would demonstrate success in your particular case, and then to agree upon methods for measuring those indicators.
So in your situation for example, what are the indicators that seem most relevant for judging the success of a rural health association? Once you and your constituents (e.g., the members, and perhaps the clients) have agreed upon these, that’s half the battle.
Beyond that, there are many other common general principles of evaluation that apply, regardless of the specific entity you are evaluating. You can find many of them in the Community Tool Box, largely in Chapters 36-39. One good place to start would be Chapter 36, Introduction to Evaluation, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/evaluate/evaluation. Take a look at the different sections within this Chapter if you haven’t done so already.
We hope this much may be helpful to you. Congratulations in advance on your MPH -- and best wishes for a successful evaluation project that will benefit all those you serve.
I am an Irish psychology student currently studying abroad in Bulgaria. Here, I am taking a course in disability, accomodation & adaption, and the psychology of social change with Prof. Ronald Harvey. As part of these courses, I will be working alongside disabled students at our university; our goal is to make the disability services here more accessible and receptive to students' needs. One major barrier to this has been the students' self advocacy, particularly for those with invisible disabilities: Many students choose not to disclose their disabilities due to previous bad experiences and a lack of faith in the services.
Even if I am unable to make policy changes to the university, I still want to change students' attitude, to encourage them to engage more with these services and with each other. To this end, I wanted to ask for advice on how to build self-advocacy and solidarity in a community of (primarily invisibly) disabled college students. Currently, I am looking towards peer-run solutions that give disabled students agency to represent and campaign for themselves (for example, peer-support groups for wellbeing, peer-run meet and greets or campus orientations).
I also want to take inspiration from my home university and their access programme (the Maynooth Access Programme or MAP). Student Central is one aspect of this programme that links disabled students to an assistant psychologist and offers them one-to-one academic support. I don't think I'll manage to find an assistant psychologist, but I am interested in setting up a similar mentor-support network between junior and senior students.
Of these suggestions (or if you have others), is there one that would be most feasible to achieve? And are these effective ways to foster community, solidarity, and self-advocacy amongst these students? If there is anything else I should explain or clarify, I would be happy to do so. Thank you so much for your time and I look forward to your response.
Naoise
Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box and for your very thoughtful, insightful, and well-expressed questions.
At the Tool Box, we are big believers in dialogue as a way of helping to address problems and issues. In your case, we would certainly advocate for dialogue between the university staff and disabled students, even if there has not been good communication between them in recent times.
So an important task you can undertake in your role is to help facilitate such a dialogue, over and above whatever dialogue might have happened in the past. University staff people need to hear what the students have to say, and students need to hear from the university, in open, frank, respectful, and ongoing in-person conversation, facilitated by a neutral person such as yourself.
This of course does not guarantee positive results, but it does increase the likelihood of the concerned parties hearing each other, learning from each other, and coming up with workable solutions that benefit everyone. And perhaps policy changes as well. For this kind of dialogue not to take place seems to us like a waste of resources.
A complementary strategy, which we think is equally worth pursuing, is to establish supportive student-led disability service structures, to the extent they have not been established already, and to maintain and strengthen those structures that now exist.
That’s because a basic truth about your situation is that is you will soon be leaving, while the students will be staying. So it should be a personal accomplishment for you, and a benefit for everyone, to leave something in place that will continue after you are gone.
More specifically, that could be done through a mentoring system such as the MAP you have described back home in Ireland. If you could identify the successful features of that effort and adapt them to Bulgaria, that sounds like an excellent thing to do
(In this connection, we should also note that the Community Tool Box also contains a considerable amount of material on mentoring, focusing on youth mentoring. You can access much of this in our Chapter 22, at https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/implement/youth-mentoring. Take a look if you can.)
Finally, you ask about building self-advocacy and solidarity in your particular setting. We think you do it by showing respect for everyone you're involved with, by supporting and validating student work, by modellng program leadership, and by establishing structures that are enjoyable and supportive for people to be part of, going beyond disability, just to enhance their general well-being. Basic social connection is important in itself.
All this is not hard, in theory. Yes, practice can be another story, but that’s part of what makes this work so challenging and rewarding!
Last point for now: We understand that many students do not wish to self-identify as being disabled; but the fact that they don’t choose to do so may mean they have a lot of ego strength. That is, they could self-identify, self-advocate and get involved if they saw good reason to do so, but in general they may simply not want to call attention to themselves. In other words, we could regard their reticence as an actual strength you can utilize and build upon.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you again for being in touch with us. We think you're on your way to developing some workable interventions and to leaving something behind that will help everyone. Stay with it! We wish you great success in your work and hope that things turn out for the very best.
Thank you for writing to us. Unfortunately, we are limited in our ability to help you, because we are based in Kansas rather than Minnesota, and also because our Ask an Advisor service is designed to respond to general questions about doing community work rather than to specific questions about particular geographic areas.
Yet it’s clear you have an interesting and challenging assignment in front of you. So in your place we might first approach the state Department of Public Health in Minnesota, present your question, and ask for their advice. Your state DPH may well be divided into regions, such as Central Minnesota, and be able to make recommendations that match up with the assignment you’ve been given (and which may help them as well). Certainly worth a try.
That said, we can mention a few Minnesota communities where we have some personal familiarity and that might also be of interest to you.
One of them is the small town of Pelican Rapids, in many ways a traditionally conservative rural community, yet also one that combines significant Mexican and Somali populations, and an apparently genuine interest in cultural diversity, but also with mixed feelings about assimilation. Given that it’s in the Western part of the state (near Fergus Falls), it may lie outside of your geographic area. Moving Eastward, though, another lively small town of possible interest might be Battle Lake, where we have attended turtle races as well as a world-class country music concert. Further East still, Sauk Centre of course will always be of interest, given its literary history.
We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thanks again for being in touch, and all best wishes for a successful and personally fulfilling project.