Greetings. We used Open Space in a similar situation two years ago in the city of Welland, Ontario, Canada with an event titled Legacy 2000. It was the specific result of a handful of individuals who felt there needed to be more done to address the "big picture" of the community and its leadership (or lack of??). It was found that planning efforts too often focused on one "silo" or sector, rather than addressing the assets and unmet needs of the entire community. Anyway, through the media, invitations were extended to the entire community of 50,000. Flyers were also mailed to all businesses and non profit organizations. Over 100 people attended the first meeting, representing a broad spectrum of government, business, and community groups as well as others who came simply as interested individuals. We used an open space format around the theme "Legacy 2000 - issues and opportunities for making Welland a better place to live, work, and play". The advisory committee didn't believe anyone would come for more than half a day so the event was hosted in one morning. They served breakfast and managed 30 meetings on 30 different topics before noon with a powerful closing circle. It was amazing...and was the beginning of some very exciting initiatives...a youth drop in centre, community gardens, trail clean ups, rehabilitating vacant lands, attracting new businesses, touring circuits, community music events etc. To keep the momentum moving, community meetings are still being held one evening a month. The ongoing theme is "Building a stronger, healthier and more vibrant Welland...one project at a time". As you suggest, the elected and government officials were originally somewhat cynical. They are now much more supportive. In fact, the mayor was at the first meeting and hasn't missed one since. The open space being provided is now being seen as a powerful vehicle for change. More importantly, it has generated community spirit - something that had been sorely lacking in a town hard hit but factory shut downs. While much of the work we do with OS takes place in a business or organization setting, it truly does work in a broader based community setting. My family and I were so impressed with what we heard at the first Legacy meetin potential, that we ourselves have moved our residence and business to Welland!
______________________________________ Brenda Herchmer Manager, Niagara Centre for Community Leadership "a one stop resource center for the voluntary sector because community matters" Niagara College 300 Woodlawn Road, Box 1005 Welland, ON L3B 5S2 (905) 735-2211 ext 7775 (905) 736-6006 (fax) >>> Viv McWaters <v...@thereef.com.au> 09/24 8:30 PM >>> Hello all I think I'm onto something very exciting but I need the wisdom of this group to help me, please. I was recently asked to come up with a proposal for a community leadership progream in a semi-rural area of Australia. The program started as Leadership - but has evolved into something like 'building social capacity'. The purpose of the program is to develop in the community the skills and abilities to self-manage and lead community organisations - such as play groups, environmental action groups, parents associations etc etc. This is in response to a lot of community burn-out, lack of access to training etc. A key element of the program (which incidently will run for 12 months) is a project that participants implement in their own community, using and building on the skills they have learnt. I have proposed that OS underpin the program. Instead of a committee identifying the content of the program we have a one-day community OS where the partiocipants themselves explore what they need to build capacity in the community - and from that, hopefully, will emerge a corte group of people willing to take this further (using OS as a basis but also incorporating some specific skills training where its been identified as impirtant). I've said my role would be as a coach/mentor - opening spaces where appropriate and supporting the participants with specifics, support etc. Has anyone done anything like this before? I'd love to hear your insights. I've also heard that the sponsor (a Local Govt) thinks this approach wouldn't work in their community. I believe it will work, but do you have any suggestions on how I could approach their concerns. I have a meeting with the sponsor later this week to further discuss the proposal. Cheers Viv McWaters Viv McWaters Beyond the Edge Pty Ltd PO Box 665, Torquay 3228 Victoria Australia Ph/Fax: 61 3 5278 3864 "Thus the task is not so much to see what no-one yet has seen, but to think what nobody yet has thought about that which everyone sees." Schopenhauer * * ========================================================== osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html =========================================================== osl...@egroups.com To subscribe, 1. Visit: http://www.egroups.com/group/oslist 2. Sign up -- provide an email address, and choose a login ID and password 3. Click on "Subscribe" and follow the instructions To unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@egroups.com: 1. Visit: http://www.egroups.com/group/oslist 2. Sign in and Proceed * * ========================================================== osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu To subscribe, unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@listserv.boisestate.edu Visit: http://listserv.boisestate.edu/archives/oslist.html =========================================================== osl...@egroups.com To subscribe, 1. Visit: http://www.egroups.com/group/oslist 2. Sign up -- provide an email address, and choose a login ID and password 3. Click on "Subscribe" and follow the instructions To unsubscribe, change your options, view the archives of osl...@egroups.com: 1. Visit: http://www.egroups.com/group/oslist 2. Sign in and Proceed
