Girl Guides circa 1956

This video interview with CNN gives a little background about the change and this article by the Calgary Herald gives a nice overview of Guides and their efforts to remain true to their roots yet adapt to modern circumstance. Highlighted in the article is the comparison between Guiding and Scouts. It seems Scouting is also trying to re-establish itself and find its place in the busy modern day to day life.

The transition of our established civic institutions to adapt to modern circumstance fascinates me. This isn’t always just about ‘re-branding’ as many institutions are looking around and trying to understand their place in community and what role they should really be playing. It is like the institutional equivalent to soul-searching. This is a tricky balance certainly. You want to stay true to your roots, after all if Guiding cut the camping and focused only on financial literacy, it wouldn’t really be the Girl Guides, it would be young hedge fund analysists with badges. On the other hand, if they only taught girls the skills that were deemed appropriate for women to know around the early 1900s when they were founded, it wouldn’t be a relevant or helpful organization to today’s young woman.

The Guides seem to be doing it well; take the structure and what was positive and add in new and relevant ways of working. Some institutional changes will require small changes in order to stay current and some will require deep consideration about their role, the ways that they operate in community and the ways that they can be most effective.

I applaud Guides and Scouts for taking a look at themselves and the context in which they work and trying to come up with new ways of working that stay true and are relevant.

Unstructured play is awesome! Who is winning? Everybody.

Interestingly, there were 127 comments after this short article. People cited the need for boundaries for children and for more fun for children. Some even seem to think that this younger generation of kids will be doomed. I think the purpose was just to point out that there is benefit to letting kids discover things on their own and to not over-program their lives. No one would argue that kids should have no boundaries and I personally do not think that any generation is ‘doomed’.

Although the article is short, it ties into a documentary that I saw recently called ‘Lost Adventures of Childhood’. Rhonda Lemire of Recreation Nova Scotia showed it during a discussion about physical activity and nutrition and it was a big wakeup call. The video plays on TV sometimes and you should watch it if you get the opportunity. I am unable to track down a copy to share as a link, unfortunately. There is, however, a link to one of the schools that was featured in the film. They implemented fun activities during recess to help deal with behavioural problems and encourage creativity. They found that when the kids engage in more creative play that there are less behavioural issues to deal with during class time.

If you are interested, here are some links to other organizations who value unstructured play for kids. I particularly liked ‘Wild Zones’, which are green spaces where whimsical, unstructured play occurs and where you don’t have to achieve anything.

Please share any good memories of lessons you learned when you were playing unsupervised as a child!

This might explain the outpouring of support for this Globe and Mail story about a kindegarden in Invermere, B.C. that hosts its class once a week in a seniors home. As of today, the article had been tweeted 1,280 times, recommended on Facebook 701 times and there were 187 comments on the article, most of them extremely positive.

People’s comments seem to indicate relief and appreciation for this simple and low-cost solution (the budget for the program was a little more than $2,000) that seems to benefit most everyone involved.

Kindegarden in a Seniors home provides opportunities for intergenerational learning and fun

Overall, the seniors and kids have responded positively. In a short video clip that appears with the story, they certainly appear to be having fun together. They seem to naturally respect and understand each other. The seniors help the kids with reading and storytelling. Other similar initiatives have seen test scores increase for the kids and medication intake decrease for the seniors.

I find it interesting that everyone has responded so positively. I think the initiative is tremendous but it seems that with many community initiatives, public response is often more cautious or questioning overall. Many community initiatives certainly do not seem to capture people’s imaginations in the same way. Is this simply an idea whose time has come in North America or are there other factors at play here?

People seem to be able to imagine the benefit to their children or aging parents and made that clear in the comments section as this comment from ‘bje1009′ illustrates:

What a beautiful and inspiring story! Children and seniors always seem such a perfect match. Even in her declining physical and mental state, my grandmother always seemed to blossom when surrounded by the young children of her nieces and nephews. … Children love unconditionally and our elders, I imagine, take great delight in such innocence. I hope this sort of program is extended throughout our school system.

Is this something that has a place in HRM? Why are people particularly delighted with this initiative? Let us know your thoughts.

Dave explores why he thinks that some people are unengaged in community and in politics. He calls for a redefinition of apathy, for us to identify things that are barriers to community engagement, and then to work collectively to dismantle those barriers.

In this blog post he invites citizens to redesign public notices to make them more beautiful and understandable so that people can more easily engage in the process that they are advertising.

A redesigned public notice that invites community participation.

Official notices are long for legal reasons, I totally understand that. What I like about his approach is that he is suggesting something that citizens can do to make public process more engaging. You could easily have an official and a colourful notice side by side.

What other small steps can be taken to get people feeling empowered and able to engage in their neighbourhoods, local politics, and community institutions?

Financial literacy is an issue being tackled by United Way Toronto.

Photo Credit: coffeego

United Way of Toronto has a Financial Literacy Strategy and they just partnered with TD Canada Trust who will commit $1,000,000 towards the strategy.

United Way of Toronto’s goal is:

To ensure low-income individuals and families have the opportunity to build the strong financial skills they’ll use well into their future. We’re going past meeting urgent needs by providing people with the appropriate financial information and problem-solving supports that will translate into lasting change. Because by working together, we can change whole communities and help provide a better life for everyone.

The Financial Literacy strategy will help prevent the deepening of poverty and return financial revenues back into the hands of those that need it most. Together, we can have a lasting impact on the economic future of vulnerable members of our community.

Read more about the partnership in a newspaper article here.

The United Way Toronto Financial Literacy Strategy was launched after a 2007 report, “Losing Ground: The Persistent Growth of Family Poverty in Canada’s Largest City” suggested that many people living in poverty didn’t have basic information about finances and as a result made bad decisions when it came to money.

The great thing about United Way of Toronto’s approach is that they developed a strategy that has many different components and they were able to find a partner in TD who is willing to contribute a significant amount of money towards that strategy.

Traditionally, United Way’s fundraise money and then invest that money in local agencies. When United Way staff and volunteers go into workplaces during a campaign, they talk about the many different agencies and initiatives that their United Way supports. With a strategy, such as the Financial Literacy strategy, a United Way can talk to people about a local issue and how they are working with different agencies, private partners, and government to make an impact in that area.

Judging by the substantial financial support from TD, this is a pretty effective way to communicate.

Interlocking issues for people require interlocking solutions from institutions.

If you are a big community-minded nerd like me, then you will likely have heard of the Tamarack Institute. They have heaps and heaps of lovely information on their website. It’s well worth a lingering perusal. Recently they have released a book called Cities Reducing Poverty. The introduction and contents page are provided in case you want to purchase the book for $10. The introduction is a great primer for wrapping your head around complex community initiatives.

Here is an excerpt:

For practically every family, then, the ingredients of poverty are part financial and part psychological, part personal and part societal, part past and part present. Every problem magnifies the impact of the others, and all are so tightly interlocked that one reversal can produce a chain reaction with results far distant from the original causes.

A rundown apartment can exacerbate a child’s asthma, which leads to a call for an ambulance, which generates a medical bill that cannot be paid, which ruins a credit record, which hikes the interest rate on an auto loan, which forces the purchase
of an unreliable used car, which jeopardizes a mother’s punctuality at work, which limits her promotions and earning capacity, which confines her to poor housing. (Shipler, 2003: 11)

The key to reducing poverty, therefore, is to unlock or disrupt these interlocking cause-and-effect relationships. This requires a comprehensive approach that is sensitive to, and eventually addresses the totality of, the interconnected problems:
… If problems are interlocking then so too solutions must be … a job alone is not enough. Medical insurance alone is not enough. Good housing alone is not enough. Reliable transportation, careful family budgeting, effective parenting, effective schooling are not enough when each is achieved in isolation from the rest. (Shipler, 2003: 11)

In the face of this bewildering array of factors, eliminating poverty for even one person or family is an intimidating prospect. Reducing poverty on a larger scale is even more daunting because the manifestations of poverty vary from person to person and from place to place.

Understanding complex issues and working together towards interlocking solutions is a central challenge for institutions who want to make impact in their community.

What is social capital? Well, if you look it up you could get many definitions. A good working definition is:

“Social Capital is comprised of social trust, assets and networks that mobilize bridging and bonding for mutual benefit and collective well-being”.

The Vancouver Foundation was surprised to find that isolation or lack of social capital was a priority issue for community leaders. Read this article from the Globe and Mail for more information. With 232 comments under the article, the topic of social capital seems to have struck a chord many folks. (If you read the comments, keep in mind that since the term ‘social capital’ is fuzzy, it gets misinterpreted and misused sometimes.)

Kids playing (and building connections)

Closer to home, Capital Health found that a sense of belonging is a critical part of our health. Their 2009 ‘Our Health: A Community Health Assessment Survey’ says that:

“Sense of belonging can be described as the extent to which individuals feel accepted, respected, included and supported by others in their social environments. It is widely recognized that a weak sense of belonging leads to unhealthy people and unhealthy communities.”

So people need strong networks of support and to feel included in order to pursue healthy lives in our communities. It is fascinating how interconnected some of these complex issues are.

Let's go for a walk in our neighbourhood!

Vancouver has taken the lead in Canada in creating urban density and walkable and bikeable neighbourhoods to aid in promoting health. The article talks about how health is related to many other factors that are outside of the control of the health care system. It says that simply adding more bucks to health care will not fix things and mentions how teamwork and collaboration between many different sectors and organizations is required to really impact health. It is always tough for organizations to switch gears and learn how to work in new ways, but more people are realizing that this needs to happen in order to really have healthy neighbourhoods and therefor, healthy cities.

The article mentions another aspect of health too, using the example of an older woman who can walk to get groceries, run into neighbours and interact with people and walk home. This sort of activity promotes stronger community ties, which is sometimes called social capital.

In short, by getting out and walking to community destinations you can build your physical health and your community connections (provided that others are out walking too!)

What is your neighbourhood like? Is it walkable? Are there shops and community facilities nearby? Do you walk more or less based on the closeness of community destinations?