GUEST
ARTICLE - Carol Munro
Study Circles
An Adventure in
Community Development
Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows (Ridge
Meadows), fast growing suburban communities on the
outskirts of Vancouver BC have recently completed the
first community wide Study Circles project in Canada.
Study Circles involve groups of 8-15
people who meet several times to discuss an issue.
Through dialogue, the group builds stronger connections
with other people, develops greater understanding of the
issue and outlines steps for action. Study Circles are
followed by an Action Forum, where an action plan is
created, using the information and ideas gathered in the
Study Circles. Detailed information on how to conduct
Study Circle projects is available free of charge from
the Study Circles Resource Centre at (www.studycircles.org).
Background
The Ridge Meadows Study Circles project
was the second phase of a community development
initiative called Building Community Solutions (BCS).
The goal of BCS is to help community groups and agencies
to work together to improve the quality of life, based
on values of mutual respect, open communication and
collaboration. BCS is funded through United Way of the
Lower Mainland: Communities in Action. The expected
outcomes of BCS are:
-
Improved services to the community
and individuals
-
More local community initiatives and
partnerships (the process is as important as the
project)
-
Shifts to funding/additional funding
-
Increased community involvement and
accountability
The project is being conducted in three
phases:
-
Phase 1: Identifying key indicators
and trends through the creation of a Community
Impact Profile
-
Phase 2: Mobilizing the community to
develop goals and targets
-
Phase 3: Investing in
strategies/achieving impact by mobilizing the
community to action.
Phase 1 began in January 2001. A
Steering Committee, with diverse representation was
recruited from the community. With the help of a
consultant, the Steering Committee identified key
indicators in the areas of population demographics,
economic factors, children and youth, education,
housing, health, environmental factors, community
participation, and public safety. The consultants
researched the indicators and produced a Community
Impact Profile report which is a “Snapshot in Time”
of the quality of life in Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows.
This report can be viewed at: http://www.unitedwaylowermainland.ca/communitiesinaction/Maple_report.html
The Process
Phase 2 began with a Forum in June,
2002, where participants celebrated the completion of
Phase 1 and identified three priority areas of concern:
I took on the work of consultant to the
project in August to assist the Steering Committee with
implementation of Phase 2. The Steering committee agreed
to use Study Circles as a method of mobilizing the
community to develop goals and targets, and the work
began in earnest in September.
I researched Study Circle guides
available through the Study Circles Resource Centre and
the Steering Committee opted to pilot two Study Circles
using a guide entitled Building Strong Neighbourhoods
for Families with Children. Steering Committee members
participated in the pilot circles, meeting four times
and following the format of the guide. I conducted an
evaluation of the pilot with input from participants and
facilitators and the guide was modified accordingly.
The Steering Committee established a
goal of holding 20 Study Circles around the community,
and the local superintendent of schools agreed that
community schools could be used for the four Study
Circle sessions.
The next step was to plan a publicity
and recruitment campaign, and to find and train
facilitators for the Circles. The timelines were tight!
Over a two month period, 50 facilitators were trained,
weekly advertisements and articles were published in
community newspapers, brochures and posters were
designed and circulated in the community, and a website
was launched (www.rmkstudycircles.ca)
. Prospective participants were encouraged to sign up
for a Study Circle in their neighbourhoods either
online, by phone, or by mailing in a tear off from the
brochure. A registration form was also printed in a
local newspaper.
About 160 people signed up to
participate in Circles and the Steering Committee made a
decision to reduce the original target for 20 Circles to
15. The Circles met once a week, over a one-month
period. Circles took place on different nights of the
week to accommodate availability of as many facilitators
and participants as possible. Dialogue moved from
creating a vision for the future of each neighbourhood
to identifying problems and possible approaches to solve
these, and finally to the creation of a list of possible
actions. Study Circle facilitators uploaded the outcomes
from each session to the website as the Circles
progressed, allowing the me to “stay on top of” the
large amount of data being gathered each week.
About three weeks after the last Circle
session, a community action forum was held. 145 people
attended, including many Study Circle participants,
facilitators and community leaders. The outcome of the
work of each Circle was posted in large format around
the facility. One participant from each Circle made a
short presentation on the highlights of the group’s
experience. The forum grouped the action ideas
under themes, and voted on which themes should take
priority for action in Phase 3 of the BCS project.
The Outcomes
The full report on the Ridge Meadows
Study Circles project can be viewed on the website (www.rmkstudycircles.ca).
Some highlights:
The 15 visions created by the Study
Circles in the different neighbourhoods reflected the
same wishes for the community. Participants expressed
the desire for neighbourhoods:
-
where people work together to
improve their neighbourhood
-
where people feel safe
-
where people care about and respect
each other and the neighbourhood
-
that are aesthetically pleasing,
pedestrian friendly, and with green space and areas
where people can meet.
Weaknesses identified in the Study
Circles fell into 7 themes having to do with safety,
crime, transportation, parenting and youth issues,
poverty/homelessness/employment and issues surrounding
community planning. In many of the Circles, participants
reminisced about how free they had been to wander their
neighbourhoods as children, learning independence
through dealing with
Strengths identified in the Circles fell
into 3 themes: People, green space/environment and
businesses/facilities/services.
Not surprisingly, the action ideas were
geared towards addressing weaknesses and building on
strengths. It is interesting to note that although crime
and safety were issues of real concern, the Circles
identified neighbours getting to know each other as
being a solution, rather than more policing, harsher
sentencing, etc. What follows are the action themes and
the number of votes each theme was given, at the Action
Forum:
-
People in neighbourhoods getting to
know each other and becoming more involved in
community life - 72 votes
-
Neighbourhood involvement in
community planning and decision making and the
Official Community Plan – 66 votes
-
Value and support our youth – 46
votes
-
More community use of public
facilities – 35 votes
-
More inclusion and accessibility –
7 votes
Project Successes
A full evaluation of the project, as
well as all the feedback gathered from the project
participants can be viewed on the website. Some
highlights:
78% of Study
Circle participants completed project evaluations. They
provided many examples of changes in attitude and
intended changes in behaviour which demonstrate that
this was a successful community development exercise:
-
91% of
participants believed that they had an increased
understanding of the beliefs and attitudes of others
-
42% of
participants believed that their ability to discuss
issues openly and frankly had increased
-
49% of
participants believes that they had an increased
understanding of their own attitudes and beliefs
-
42% of
participants believed that their ability to
communicate more effectively had increased
When asked
how the Study Circles affected what people would do, an
overwhelming number of the 103 responses indicated that
participants had experienced a change:
Many comments
indicated a new commitment to become more involved in
community life. Some examples:
-
“It has
made me want to contribute more to my community”
-
“Take
personal responsibility for the small things I can
do”
-
“Feel
more connected to larger community”
Other comments
indicated a change in attitudes towards the community,
themselves, and others. Some examples:
-
“I am
more concretely hopeful about the changes I want to
see”
-
“It
makes me think about myself and how I’m going to
raise my children in ten years”
-
“Identified
a gap between my feelings and my actions
-
“Made me
understand other people’s perspectives regarding
solutions”
-
“Have
changed my general outlook”
When asked
what they had learned that surprised them, participants
indicated an increased awareness of what they shared
with their neighbours and how they appreciated the
different perspectives. Some examples:
-
“We all
have similar concerns and beliefs about our
neighbourhood”
-
“A lot of people have the same concerns/ideas”
-
“Respectfulness”
-
“Different perspectives, ways of interpreting”
When asked
how the Study Circles affected the way they think about
neighbourhoods and families, participants indicated a
new awareness of how important it was for people in
neighbourhoods to be connected with each other. Some
examples:
-
“Everyone
wants to live closer together, be connected &
less lonely”
-
“Think
about neighbours differently and want to talk them
and have deeper conversations regarding our
community and neighbourhood issues”
-
“Rekindled
memories; now want to build a stoop/veranda to be
more involved in life on my street”
-
“Study
Circles have affected the way I see the big
picture - my inspiration, how I see how a little
group can make a difference”
When asked
what they found most valuable about the Study Circles,
participants indicated a new sense of hope that they
could make a difference, and an appreciation of the
views and ideas of others:
-
“Sense
of community and hope”
-
“Useful
to witness degree of knowledge neighbours have re:
community and what makes a good one”
-
“Hope
to make a difference; connections; to actively do
something”
-
“Learning
about the difference between debate and dialogue; to
think about our own reaction to other’s ideas”
Project Challenges
The project evaluation (can be viewed in
full on the website) contains a section “What would we
do differently next time?” Much of this relates to
organizational details of how to involve key players and
the community.
Overall, a strong network needs to be
created well in advance. A sizable group of “change
champions”, who are well connected in the community,
need to be committed to getting the message out and
recruiting a diversity of participants. Personal contact
appears to be the most effective (and least costly)
method of recruitment, and this cannot be done by a few
people.
A major challenge that is not documented
in the report is that the concept of community
development is foreign to many people who may see this
sort of initiative as just another project that will end
up as a report gathering dust somewhere. Because the
process is somewhat complex, it is difficult to get the
message out to the community at large, and people are
generally unwilling to commit to attending four sessions
without some idea of what the outcome might be – who
would implement the action plans that were developed in
the Study Circles, etc. On the positive side, the people
who did participate in the project now see the value of
community development approaches. By the end of the
Study Circles they clearly demonstrated that they
understood that the process was at least as valuable as
whatever action may come as a result of that process.
This project was publicized widely in
the local newspapers, with a series of advertisements
and press releases, however we were unable to state
clearly what would happen following the Study Circles,
other than to say that the next phase (Phase III) of the
Building Community Solutions project would be an
“action” phase. If we had suggested that people
would be expected to continue to participate in taking
action, it would have been even more difficult to
recruit participants. We could also not state clearly
that the steering committee would commit to implementing
the action plans, because we had no idea of what these
might be, or if we would have the capacity to take
recommended actions.
With this in mind, I would encourage
anyone taking on such a project to have a clear plan for
the sustainability of the initiative – a plan that can
be communicated clearly to study circles participants in
advance. It would probably help to examine the outcomes
of projects such as this one, and to develop different
scenarios of what might happen, think about what next
steps might look like based on these. While it seems
almost impossible to plan next steps without knowing the
outcomes of the study circles, a group could say “We
will invite the Study Circles participants to help us to
prioritize the action plans developed in the Study
Circles at the Action Forum, then form new groups to
take action.” This would show that action was
intended, and that study circles participants need not
feel obligated to participate in the next phase.
I believe that it would also be
important to develop and advertise timelines for the
phase that will follow the Study Circles in advance, and
to ensure that this phase begins while people are still
interested and excited in the project. Planning projects
such as this, that will span a period of months, also
needs to take seasonal issues in mind. Summer and
Christmas holiday times can interrupt the momentum and
excitement that builds throughout the project.
Next Steps in the Ridge Meadows
Project
At this time, the steering committee has
been fortunate in attracting new members from amongst
the Study Circles participants. The report has
been published on the website and made available to the
Study Circles participants and key players in the
community.
Study Circles participants are being
contacted by email and telephone, over the summer, to
ask for their participation in Phase III, and new people
are being recruited through personal contact and the
website.
The steering committee will focus Phase
III on the issue deemed most important by Study Circles
and Forum participants: “People in neighbourhoods
getting to know each other and becoming more involved in
community life through:
1. Neighbourhood Study Circle support
and encouragement
-
Support and networking opportunities
-
Ongoing encouragement of building
neighbourhood connections (i.e. Block Party Kit,
etc.)
-
Support action strategies, projects
(provide promotion opportunities, networking, etc)
-
Support celebrations
2. Neighbourhood/ Community Leadership Development
-
Community Workshops (focus on education, leadership
development, etc)
-
Education on Official Community Plan and processes
-
Explore methods to ensure input into municipal planning
3. Sustainability
Conclusion
As consultant to this project, I can say
without reservation that while it took a huge amount of
work and commitment, on my own part and on the part of
the steering committee, that it was well worth while.
Every week during that 4 week study
circle process, the facilitators sent me the outputs of
the discussions – people’s hopes and dreams for the
community, the things they want to improve and their
creative ideas, and as I read through all this data, I
was struck by the awesome power of what can happen when
people engage in respectful dialogue. The lists appended
to the report that document what participants said they
had learned; what they say they will do differently in
the future as individuals, and how the Study Circles
affected they way they think about community is awesome!
I was reminded of the famous butterfly
effect, where Edward Lorenz, a meteorologist,
scientifically investigated whether or not the flap of a
butterfly wing in Tokyo affected a Tornado in Texas or a
thunderstorm in New York. The answer was “yes”!
Carol
Munro is a consultant working in the Lower Mainland
of BC, and living in the beautiful Gulf Islands. With a
Master's in Leadership, and 10 years of experience
in non profit management, Carol works with non profit
organizations and different levels of government in the
areas of strategic planning, community development,
evaluation, program planning and marketing, and board
development
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