While much of American political organizing caters to particular group
interests and identities, the IAF works to create bridging social capital by
bringing leaders from different faith communities together in what it calls
broad-based organizations. Warren, 32
The reading I did for this week made me think of how communities are organized and how communities function based up that organization. Now, this blog post is going to bridge back to community informatics a little bit, but I think Warren's chapters apply to this post.
Both Starbucks and Toyota are limited in their social media teams; Starbucks has six people on their team, and Toyota has three people on theirs. In addition, I doubt anyone on the Starbucks team can make a Frappuccino or anyone on the Toyota team can explain how the sticking accelerator is being fixed. But each company has employees that are experts in these areas.
So, when Starbucks created MyStarbucksidea.com, the social media team wasn't creating content and responding to ideas posted by customers. Instead, "Starbucks set out to ensure the departments impacted by the site (which includes practically every department) had a representative who was responsible for being the liaison" (from Engagement Database Report found on the website). The Mini-Starbucks Card was actually a customer idea that made its way to Chuck Davidson, an employee at Starbucks. He traced the comments, wrote a proposal, and put it into action.
Toyota has as similar breakdown in roles:
"Take a look at the Twitter account and you’ll see that in addition to DeYager, three public relations specialists from sales, environment/safety, and public affairs/community outreach contribute posts. The Toyota Twitter team uses monitoring software to identify tweets mentioning Toyota, then responds from a respective area of expertise using technology from CoTweet to manage multiple authors on the single Twitter account. This same mode is utilized on Toyota’s Facebook pages — response requests are sent out and come back from around the company, depending on the topic" (from Engagement Database Report found on the website).
What is interesting about social media is that that Warren's dynamic, as explained by Walter, Kretzmann, and McNknight on page 68 of their text, fits into effective organization social media strategies.
Warren i1 963, ix) identities two dimensions of community involving either, relations of units (whether individuals, groups, or organizations). The horizontal dimension involves "the relation of local units to one another"; this is what we think of as the community. The vertical dimension involves "the relation of local units to extracommunity systems" in the larger society and culture. (68)
We can think of employees and internal communications as being on the horizontal axis and consumers and external communications (PR and brand affinity) as being on the vertical axis.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Gang Leader for a Day: A case study
While reading the assigned texts for this week, I was also reading a book I’ve been interested in checking out for quite some time now: Gang Leader for a Day A rogue sociologist takes to the streets by Sudahir Venkatesh. While I was hesitant to read a trade paperback (New York Times Bestseller) with such a wildly dramatic title, the contents basically detail Venkatesh’s methods for doing research, as well as offer an interesting version of Adele Clarke’s (Situational Analysis) project memoing. Basically, the book details Venkatesh’s fieldwork in the Robert Taylor Homes on Chicago’s Southside. He started out wishing to do a simple survey on urban poverty and ended up hanging out with the Black Kings doing research on the underground economy of the urban poor. The book discusses his misconceptions, his mess-ups, and his relationships with the community. It seems to me that it might have been more accurately titled, “A naïve sociologist takes to the streets.”
Interestingly, the readings intersected with the readings we did for class this week. In fact, Gang Leader for a Day (GLFAD) almost seemed an example of what NOT to do when working with communities. Venkatesh worked with a prominent African American sociologist in an attempt to help find solutions to urban poverty. But rather than just accept the status quo, he wanted to understand the people and the situations he studied; he saw and experienced life on the streets and decided that sociology’s attempts to understand the people it studies were far from real. Certainly, Venkatesh’s motives seemed altruistic, but, as he admits in the book, his presence caused great harm to many of his subjects. For example, after granting him interviews, some community members end up on the outs with those in power—even suffering physical violence—because Venkatesh leaked information.
The valuable intersections I recognized while doing these readings in tandem were especially connected to “For Communities to Work” and to “Community Building Practice.” When looking at GLFAD, one can see at play multiple points from the readings. For example, Venkatesh is sometimes invited to sit in on Ms. Bailey’s (building president of the Local Advisory Council) tenant meetings. It is interesting to see that during these meetings, it is apparent that a “public” is definitely at work in the Robert Taylor Homes. In fact, some of them are even “engaged.” They show up at meetings and make suggestions for helping the community. However, where things begin to break down is evident on page 2 of “For Communities to Work:” “the amount of political will available in a community seems to depend on the extent to which people claim responsibility for what happens to them. They have to own their problems rather than blaming them on others.”
In many ways, this quote makes perfect sense: People have to take responsibility for the problems in their community and work to change them. In addition, they must take on the role of agent rather than of victim if they are to work toward changing their communities. But, this smacks suspiciously of what Victor Villanueva refers to as a bootstrap mentality. I wonder how this could work in a community that is so oppressed that it feels it can only embrace its victim status because to do otherwise would seem nonsensical. Ms. Bailey, the LAC president illustrates this point beautifully when reprimanding Venkatesh for asking the wrong questions and focusing on the wrong things in his study. She adeptly uses the Socratic method to show him the error of his thinking. This short excerpt from page 147 of GLFAD illustrates the point:
“You planning on talking with white people in your study?” she snapped, waving her hand at me as if she’d heard my spiel a hundred times already.
I was confused. “This is a study of the Robert Taylor Homes, and I suppose that most of the people I’ll be talking to are black. Unless there are whites who live here that I’m not aware of.”
“If I gave you only one piece of bread to eat each day and asked why you’re starving, what would you say?”
I was thrown off by this seeming non sequitur. I thought for a minute. “I guess I would say I’m starving because I’m not eating enough,” I answered.
“You got a lot to learn, Mr. Professor,” she said. “Again, if I gave you one piece of bread to eat each day and asked why you’re starving, what would you say?”
I was getting even more confused. I took a chance. “Because you’re not feeding me?”
“Yes! Very good!”
So, what is basically going on here is that Ms. Bailey, a force to be reckoned with in the community, wants the researcher to understand that the community is at the mercy of those outside it. I wonder what the Kettering Foundation would do with that.
Interestingly, the readings intersected with the readings we did for class this week. In fact, Gang Leader for a Day (GLFAD) almost seemed an example of what NOT to do when working with communities. Venkatesh worked with a prominent African American sociologist in an attempt to help find solutions to urban poverty. But rather than just accept the status quo, he wanted to understand the people and the situations he studied; he saw and experienced life on the streets and decided that sociology’s attempts to understand the people it studies were far from real. Certainly, Venkatesh’s motives seemed altruistic, but, as he admits in the book, his presence caused great harm to many of his subjects. For example, after granting him interviews, some community members end up on the outs with those in power—even suffering physical violence—because Venkatesh leaked information.
The valuable intersections I recognized while doing these readings in tandem were especially connected to “For Communities to Work” and to “Community Building Practice.” When looking at GLFAD, one can see at play multiple points from the readings. For example, Venkatesh is sometimes invited to sit in on Ms. Bailey’s (building president of the Local Advisory Council) tenant meetings. It is interesting to see that during these meetings, it is apparent that a “public” is definitely at work in the Robert Taylor Homes. In fact, some of them are even “engaged.” They show up at meetings and make suggestions for helping the community. However, where things begin to break down is evident on page 2 of “For Communities to Work:” “the amount of political will available in a community seems to depend on the extent to which people claim responsibility for what happens to them. They have to own their problems rather than blaming them on others.”
In many ways, this quote makes perfect sense: People have to take responsibility for the problems in their community and work to change them. In addition, they must take on the role of agent rather than of victim if they are to work toward changing their communities. But, this smacks suspiciously of what Victor Villanueva refers to as a bootstrap mentality. I wonder how this could work in a community that is so oppressed that it feels it can only embrace its victim status because to do otherwise would seem nonsensical. Ms. Bailey, the LAC president illustrates this point beautifully when reprimanding Venkatesh for asking the wrong questions and focusing on the wrong things in his study. She adeptly uses the Socratic method to show him the error of his thinking. This short excerpt from page 147 of GLFAD illustrates the point:
“You planning on talking with white people in your study?” she snapped, waving her hand at me as if she’d heard my spiel a hundred times already.
I was confused. “This is a study of the Robert Taylor Homes, and I suppose that most of the people I’ll be talking to are black. Unless there are whites who live here that I’m not aware of.”
“If I gave you only one piece of bread to eat each day and asked why you’re starving, what would you say?”
I was thrown off by this seeming non sequitur. I thought for a minute. “I guess I would say I’m starving because I’m not eating enough,” I answered.
“You got a lot to learn, Mr. Professor,” she said. “Again, if I gave you one piece of bread to eat each day and asked why you’re starving, what would you say?”
I was getting even more confused. I took a chance. “Because you’re not feeding me?”
“Yes! Very good!”
So, what is basically going on here is that Ms. Bailey, a force to be reckoned with in the community, wants the researcher to understand that the community is at the mercy of those outside it. I wonder what the Kettering Foundation would do with that.
Creating Citizens, Creating Community?
Governments can't create citizens (Matthews).
For some reason this line sparked a train of thought and personal memories, which I have basically outlined here. While reading the readings for today I am reminded of a TV special on Meth addiction and how it started in Oregon and spread East all across the US in record time, which led me to think about my home town and it's special issue with Meth.
There was a serious meth problem in my hometown (Ovid, not Westphalia)---so much so that a meth house blew up a block away from my house---I was at home when it happened--it felt like an earthquake, or what I assume an earthquake would feel like. No one was at the house that blew up--thank goodness. However, the house was completely destroyed. It just so happened that the firefighters were having a fund raiser that night in the Town Hall and there was drinking involved so none of them were in any condition to fight a fire.
Anyway, more to the point. Why didn't the community come together to fix this meth issue? What would have happened if they did? Knowing what I know now I realize that the meth problem (at least in the schools) was strictly the "stoner kids" it didn't directly effect the jocks, cheerleaders, nerds, or anyone besides those "lost cause, stoner kids." But what would have happened if one of the stoner kids shared with a jock or cheerleader or other student who was higher on the high school hierarchy? I assume that their parents would get involved and then there would have been community action. But since we have a marginalized group of people whom have been deemed unhelpable or whatever, nothing was done.
This is a example of citizenship not taking place. No one stepped up to fix this serious problem. It wasn't addressed in the school. Even after the meth house blew up NO ONE talked about it! At least not to the students, whom it was obviously effecting. Knowing what know now this is rather frustrating and disappointing…
Random Thoughts
People being citizens---doing citizenship---is this always a good thing? The people on the flight that crashed in Pennslyvania on 9/11 were being citizens---practicing citizenship---saving lives.
But what about protesters---standing up for what they believe in ---are they doing citizenship? What about terrorist doing what they believe to be citizenship? Are there right and wrong ways to do citizenship or is it more a matter of moral versus immoral ways of doing citizenship?
Kinda like Martin Luther King Jr. versus Malcolm X (before he went on Hajj) Both were doing work for the black community--trying to change the world--just in different ways.
"Some of the most striking instances of the force of political will come from stories of how people have acted in times of crisis" (Matthews). Reminds me of learning about the Civil War--when so many Westpoint graduates stood out as leaders---changing our country.
“Own their problems rather than blaming them on others” (Matthews)
What if the problems really aren't their fault---I am told repeatedly that "urban youth" are the way that they are because of certain systems that are in place which ultimately keep them there and perpetuate the cycle of poverty…
Perhaps communities wanting to solve an issue may benefit from producing a logic model?
For some reason this line sparked a train of thought and personal memories, which I have basically outlined here. While reading the readings for today I am reminded of a TV special on Meth addiction and how it started in Oregon and spread East all across the US in record time, which led me to think about my home town and it's special issue with Meth.
There was a serious meth problem in my hometown (Ovid, not Westphalia)---so much so that a meth house blew up a block away from my house---I was at home when it happened--it felt like an earthquake, or what I assume an earthquake would feel like. No one was at the house that blew up--thank goodness. However, the house was completely destroyed. It just so happened that the firefighters were having a fund raiser that night in the Town Hall and there was drinking involved so none of them were in any condition to fight a fire.
Anyway, more to the point. Why didn't the community come together to fix this meth issue? What would have happened if they did? Knowing what I know now I realize that the meth problem (at least in the schools) was strictly the "stoner kids" it didn't directly effect the jocks, cheerleaders, nerds, or anyone besides those "lost cause, stoner kids." But what would have happened if one of the stoner kids shared with a jock or cheerleader or other student who was higher on the high school hierarchy? I assume that their parents would get involved and then there would have been community action. But since we have a marginalized group of people whom have been deemed unhelpable or whatever, nothing was done.
This is a example of citizenship not taking place. No one stepped up to fix this serious problem. It wasn't addressed in the school. Even after the meth house blew up NO ONE talked about it! At least not to the students, whom it was obviously effecting. Knowing what know now this is rather frustrating and disappointing…
Random Thoughts
People being citizens---doing citizenship---is this always a good thing? The people on the flight that crashed in Pennslyvania on 9/11 were being citizens---practicing citizenship---saving lives.
But what about protesters---standing up for what they believe in ---are they doing citizenship? What about terrorist doing what they believe to be citizenship? Are there right and wrong ways to do citizenship or is it more a matter of moral versus immoral ways of doing citizenship?
Kinda like Martin Luther King Jr. versus Malcolm X (before he went on Hajj) Both were doing work for the black community--trying to change the world--just in different ways.
"Some of the most striking instances of the force of political will come from stories of how people have acted in times of crisis" (Matthews). Reminds me of learning about the Civil War--when so many Westpoint graduates stood out as leaders---changing our country.
“Own their problems rather than blaming them on others” (Matthews)
What if the problems really aren't their fault---I am told repeatedly that "urban youth" are the way that they are because of certain systems that are in place which ultimately keep them there and perpetuate the cycle of poverty…
Perhaps communities wanting to solve an issue may benefit from producing a logic model?
Monday, April 12, 2010
Conceptualizing Community
"How we conceptualize community powerfully influences what we see and do in community practice" (Walter 67).
This quote, although seemingly obvious, really made me start thinking (again) about what community is and how we can define it. I've been constantly thinking about defining community for the last 12 weeks, and each week it seems like my old definition is thrown out the window, and I start all over again. Or maybe I don't. Maybe I build on the fallacies of my previous definitions to create a more concrete (and perhaps "better") definition of community for myself. Because, let's face it, community is a pretty complex thing. There are so many ways to define it, and these definitions, as Walter says, influence our work in the community.
The traditional definition of community (Warren 1963) is a boundaried social or demographic unit (Walter 67), but, as Walter says, it doesn't take into account our work in the community. Our work in the community influences and, in a way, defines the community. And there are also multiple consciousnesses in play here that are not always taken into account. To ignore these consciousnesses issues may be oversimplified (Walter 68). Oversimplifying issues is never a good way to help the community.
This got me thinking about my own work in the community through various institutions. I'll use my service learning for TE 250 as an example. I really think that the issues here were oversimplified, and therefore, did not help the community as was originally intended. In TE 250 it was assumed that urban schools needed our help. Fine. That sounds great. I know that there are usually lower reading scores, etc., in urban schools, and I'm all for raising them. However, I was placed in a science class and was basically just there to help manage the classroom. Sometimes I tutored kids or gave them extra help, but I don't really think it enhanced their learning in any meaningful way. What if all the students in my class had chosen one school to work at, picked an issue with the help of administrators and professors and then did our service learning focused on that? That would've gotten to the heart of the issue and provided real help to the students.
We didn't take into account all the forces and all the relationships that helped to define that school community. So we oversimplified and didn't provide any real help. I just got my hours and my grade. If we're going to go out into the community, we should help the community more than ourselves.
So what do I think a community is this week?? Well, I think that it's basically formed by interactions of people with similar concerns and that there are many factors that come into play when forming a community.
I have three more weeks to come up with a concrete definition... Can I do it?? ;)
This quote, although seemingly obvious, really made me start thinking (again) about what community is and how we can define it. I've been constantly thinking about defining community for the last 12 weeks, and each week it seems like my old definition is thrown out the window, and I start all over again. Or maybe I don't. Maybe I build on the fallacies of my previous definitions to create a more concrete (and perhaps "better") definition of community for myself. Because, let's face it, community is a pretty complex thing. There are so many ways to define it, and these definitions, as Walter says, influence our work in the community.
The traditional definition of community (Warren 1963) is a boundaried social or demographic unit (Walter 67), but, as Walter says, it doesn't take into account our work in the community. Our work in the community influences and, in a way, defines the community. And there are also multiple consciousnesses in play here that are not always taken into account. To ignore these consciousnesses issues may be oversimplified (Walter 68). Oversimplifying issues is never a good way to help the community.
This got me thinking about my own work in the community through various institutions. I'll use my service learning for TE 250 as an example. I really think that the issues here were oversimplified, and therefore, did not help the community as was originally intended. In TE 250 it was assumed that urban schools needed our help. Fine. That sounds great. I know that there are usually lower reading scores, etc., in urban schools, and I'm all for raising them. However, I was placed in a science class and was basically just there to help manage the classroom. Sometimes I tutored kids or gave them extra help, but I don't really think it enhanced their learning in any meaningful way. What if all the students in my class had chosen one school to work at, picked an issue with the help of administrators and professors and then did our service learning focused on that? That would've gotten to the heart of the issue and provided real help to the students.
We didn't take into account all the forces and all the relationships that helped to define that school community. So we oversimplified and didn't provide any real help. I just got my hours and my grade. If we're going to go out into the community, we should help the community more than ourselves.
So what do I think a community is this week?? Well, I think that it's basically formed by interactions of people with similar concerns and that there are many factors that come into play when forming a community.
I have three more weeks to come up with a concrete definition... Can I do it?? ;)
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Changing Military Invention and Documentation
The way I have been approaching digital media has been through leveraging groups and communities that previously did not exist. They used media to create channels of communication that were previously not there in order to address a matter of concern. The interesting thing about Jeff's Book is that it is focused on how existent communities adopt communal writing (inventing) technologies. And it made me wonder, what other examples can I find out there of communal writing. Shiky, who I have drawing from all semeseter, offers examples about how groups arise out of thin air. What happens when groups adopt new writing technologies.
The Military
The US military recently wikyfied their army field manuals. Soldiers have had problems in Afghanistan and Iraq with enemy combatants adjusting to field procedures. To address this problem the army implemented technology that allowed updates to be made on the fly. Now, field soldiers can update the procedures as they encounter new enemy tactics. This technology turned every member of the military into a writer. The advantage of a wiki is that it allows the community members who experience the problems in the field to post a solution. But it also maintains military hierarchy. Writers, in this case, are still on the low end of the pole. Higher ranking officials still control how this technology is used and who can use it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3aJ3zeAv6g&feature=player_embedded
In this example, there is an existent community that adopted an new technology that changed the way they produced and shared knowledge. This is the way that infrastructures adjust to support invention that ultimately improves the function of a community. As Grabill mentions in his book, Star and Ruhleder believe that infrastructures become invisible as they break down (91). The standard infrastructure that supported the production of field manuals was no longer adequate. If you will, that infrastructure became exposed and open to attack.
One other interesting note that the normal rigid connection between expert and status breaks down. Now the experts on the enemy, the soldiers in the field, can update the manual as needed while still keeping their status as field soldiers.
The Military
The US military recently wikyfied their army field manuals. Soldiers have had problems in Afghanistan and Iraq with enemy combatants adjusting to field procedures. To address this problem the army implemented technology that allowed updates to be made on the fly. Now, field soldiers can update the procedures as they encounter new enemy tactics. This technology turned every member of the military into a writer. The advantage of a wiki is that it allows the community members who experience the problems in the field to post a solution. But it also maintains military hierarchy. Writers, in this case, are still on the low end of the pole. Higher ranking officials still control how this technology is used and who can use it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3aJ3zeAv6g&feature=player_embedded
In this example, there is an existent community that adopted an new technology that changed the way they produced and shared knowledge. This is the way that infrastructures adjust to support invention that ultimately improves the function of a community. As Grabill mentions in his book, Star and Ruhleder believe that infrastructures become invisible as they break down (91). The standard infrastructure that supported the production of field manuals was no longer adequate. If you will, that infrastructure became exposed and open to attack.
One other interesting note that the normal rigid connection between expert and status breaks down. Now the experts on the enemy, the soldiers in the field, can update the manual as needed while still keeping their status as field soldiers.
Monday, April 5, 2010
"People working and writing within communities need help, and they know it. But they do not need certain kinds of help" (63).
Reading this, I thought, "Wow. That seems kind of like common sense." But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that this could probably be ignored by people working in communities. To use the example from the book, community member Barbara says that it's helpful when experts present scientific information and facts, but people from universities come out and just want to talk to them (63). What do people hope to accomplish by just talking to community members? Are they trying to give them a voice? Because it seems to me, the people in Harbor already kind of have a voice. They just need more information to make their voice and rhetorical tools more powerful.
This got me thinking about the Cushman piece. What if Cushman had just gone into the community and talked to the residents and then published her findings. I think the piece would've been much less convincing. Instead, the lived in the community and worked with the residents. She helped them navigate the complex social services system. She gave them the kind of help and expertise they needed.
So if experts go into a community like Harbor and interview the residents about the effects of the pollution and then publish their findings, sure it gives the community a voice, in a way. But it also takes their voice away, and makes them less able to write for change.
Reading this, I thought, "Wow. That seems kind of like common sense." But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that this could probably be ignored by people working in communities. To use the example from the book, community member Barbara says that it's helpful when experts present scientific information and facts, but people from universities come out and just want to talk to them (63). What do people hope to accomplish by just talking to community members? Are they trying to give them a voice? Because it seems to me, the people in Harbor already kind of have a voice. They just need more information to make their voice and rhetorical tools more powerful.
This got me thinking about the Cushman piece. What if Cushman had just gone into the community and talked to the residents and then published her findings. I think the piece would've been much less convincing. Instead, the lived in the community and worked with the residents. She helped them navigate the complex social services system. She gave them the kind of help and expertise they needed.
So if experts go into a community like Harbor and interview the residents about the effects of the pollution and then publish their findings, sure it gives the community a voice, in a way. But it also takes their voice away, and makes them less able to write for change.
Communitation, Commodities... and others
Linear Communication
The concept of linear communication was mentioned in the book, and my first thought was in what way is communication every linear? Sure there is face-to-face communication, but in today's world I think communication is hardly linear at all.
In my experience I get a lot of my information that at one point in time would have been communicated by family members to me personally, through facebook or twitter. I see an announcement or a status change or something and I will "Like" it or say congrats, but this is a rather indirect form of communication. When someone becomes engaged there is no longer a phone call letting everyone know, your status changes on facebook and it is assumed that everyone knows.
Information as a commodity
In some ways yes, information is a commodity. It can be bought and sold. However I agree that this analogy is "insuffient because it assumes use." Commodities are used, they are (for the most part) considered useful. In many cases information isn't used. It isn't read, understood, or if it is read or understood then it isn't applied. It is rather dangerous to assume that the information sent out to people in the community via fliers, door to door visits, emails, mailings, or other things are read, understood, and used.
The census is an example of this. We are trying to bring together our entire "imagined community" the United States of America in order to find out just how many of us there are. WE have seen advertisement after advertisements on TV on the internet, in the paper, on the bus. Everywhere. But half of Americans (people in our community) didn't know when the census was coming, what it was used for, what questions are on there, or when it was supposed to be mailed back. The information was presented to them, but it wasn't read, understood, or used.
Community Change
Documents or writing pieces that promote community change or cause change are mundane pieces of work. I don't have much to say about this concept because I feel that it alone says it all. I just felt it was worth mentioning because it is so true.
It reminds me of why I want to be a grant writer. Grant proposals don't get awards. They are read once and filed away. (in some cases they are used later for other things). They are not applauded for the wonderful prose and excellent use of imagery. They will not be found in text books or taught in classrooms. But they MAKE a difference in the world, in the country, in the community in which their plans are implemented. That is why I want to write them. To make a difference. :)
The concept of linear communication was mentioned in the book, and my first thought was in what way is communication every linear? Sure there is face-to-face communication, but in today's world I think communication is hardly linear at all.
In my experience I get a lot of my information that at one point in time would have been communicated by family members to me personally, through facebook or twitter. I see an announcement or a status change or something and I will "Like" it or say congrats, but this is a rather indirect form of communication. When someone becomes engaged there is no longer a phone call letting everyone know, your status changes on facebook and it is assumed that everyone knows.
Information as a commodity
In some ways yes, information is a commodity. It can be bought and sold. However I agree that this analogy is "insuffient because it assumes use." Commodities are used, they are (for the most part) considered useful. In many cases information isn't used. It isn't read, understood, or if it is read or understood then it isn't applied. It is rather dangerous to assume that the information sent out to people in the community via fliers, door to door visits, emails, mailings, or other things are read, understood, and used.
The census is an example of this. We are trying to bring together our entire "imagined community" the United States of America in order to find out just how many of us there are. WE have seen advertisement after advertisements on TV on the internet, in the paper, on the bus. Everywhere. But half of Americans (people in our community) didn't know when the census was coming, what it was used for, what questions are on there, or when it was supposed to be mailed back. The information was presented to them, but it wasn't read, understood, or used.
Community Change
Documents or writing pieces that promote community change or cause change are mundane pieces of work. I don't have much to say about this concept because I feel that it alone says it all. I just felt it was worth mentioning because it is so true.
It reminds me of why I want to be a grant writer. Grant proposals don't get awards. They are read once and filed away. (in some cases they are used later for other things). They are not applauded for the wonderful prose and excellent use of imagery. They will not be found in text books or taught in classrooms. But they MAKE a difference in the world, in the country, in the community in which their plans are implemented. That is why I want to write them. To make a difference. :)
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