Community Circles

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" rowspan="2" width=200 BGCOLOR="#99CC99" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="1278dfc3.jpg"> <div> <A HREF="id54.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Hamlet Study"><U><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700c866330000.gif" HEIGHT="13" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Hamlet Study</U></A></div> <div> <B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700c866330000.gif" HEIGHT="13" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Community Circles</B></div> <div> <A HREF="id57.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Community Land Trust"><U><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700c866330000.gif" HEIGHT="13" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">Community Land Trust</U></A></div> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=82 BGCOLOR="#CCCC99" TEXT="#080000" bgproperties="fixed" background="1288dfe1esnpes.jpg"> <div> <FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#336666" FACE="Arial" ><B>New Directions CBRI</B></FONT><B>     |     </B><A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="New Directions CBRI"><U><B>home</B></U></A></div> <div> back to  <A HREF="id51.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="South Country"><U><B>South Country</B></U></A></div> <div> </div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" height=398 colspan=2 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <B>Community Circles</B></div> <div> (November, 2003)          </div> <bR> <div> <U>Project Description </U></div> <bR> <div> <I>Discover South Country </I>employs<I> </I>a proven process for giving a voice to local citizens. The Study Circle Resource Center of Pomfret, Connecticut has been working with 400 U.S. communities since 1989 to help promote citizen participation, strengthen democracy, and solve public problems. Last spring, they welcomed New Directions' invitation to collaborate with the South Country Central School District and its Family Support Center to empower the South Country community.  The Study Circle Resource Center has provided advice and tools to establish community-wide dialogues. </div> <bR> <div> Communities everywhere face a wide array of complex challenges that appear to yield only to some variety of this innovative and inclusive approach to community problem solving.</div> <bR> <div> Community Circles are groups of 8-10 people who meet four or five times to discuss a community issue. They listen to one another and share experiences, concerns and insights on this issue, guided by a facilitator. Communities have organized as many as 400 people in these small groups, meeting concurrently on the same issue. In such a round of Circles, a community can illuminate public problems and find solutions. In so doing, people change, form new relationships and networks, create new working collaborations, redesign institutions or set up new ones, and change public policy. Over time, they improve and strengthen their community in this collaborative process.</div> <bR> <div> In 1998, for example, New Directions designed and conducted a Community Circles process for the Summit Council of the Bay Shore-Brightwaters School District. It featured technical assistance on land use questions by professors and students from N.Y.I.T. School of Architecture. At the end of three sessions, area civic associations and the Summit Council had produced an agreed-upon approach to neighborhood development.</div> <bR> <div> On October 20, 2003, with help from the Study Circle Resource Center and New Directions, a small group of South Country citizens and service providers have been piloting an example of this guided dialogue process on the subject of supporting families with children. It will conclude all four sessions of its pilot round before the end of 2003. In January and February, 2004, an effort to build a community-wide coalition of local institutional sponsors for this dialogue will be conducted. Following that, in March and April, 2004, the first of what we hope will be many twice yearly rounds of these Community Circles<I><B> </B></I>sessions will be conducted. We hope to attract over 200 participants in this dialogue and conduct a community-wide action forum on its conclusions. Subsequent <I>Circles</I> will explore a range of issues which interest local people. </div> <bR> <div> (February, 2004)          <U>Community Circles Progress Report</U></div> <bR> <div>      On January 12, 2004, William Sells and Michael Dinowitz volunteered to be co-chairmen of the Community Circles Initiative Steering Committee. This committee hopes to organize and conduct a round of Community Circles<I> </I>discussions this spring, recruiting 15 groups of 10 people each from all corners of South Country to discuss the needs of this community. </div> <div>      </div> <div>      Community Circles has grown out of a Pilot Program conducted by ten South Country residents who met on five occasions, October 10<FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >th</FONT>, November 3<FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >rd</FONT> and 24<FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >th</FONT>, and December 1st and 8<FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" >th</FONT>, to discuss the topic of Supporting Families with Children.</div> <bR> <div>      Using SCRC discussion guides and convened by New Directions facilitators, this group came to the following conclusions<B>:</B></div> <div>      </div> <div> (1)  South Country would greatly benefit if it organized an ongoing community dialogue among residents of its five or more neighborhoods.</div> <div> (2)  There is a need in the school district to provide, or arrange for, mentoring and teen pregnancy human services.</div> <div> (3)  There is also need for leadership training and parents' effectiveness training.</div> <bR> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>