Pictured: Tamariki Toa, Nelson Central School, performing at Te Mana Kuratahi 2019.
Our Approach
Research and experience show that children and whānau do better when they live in strong, connected environments.
Alongside appropriate support services, community-led action plays a key role in enabling people, places and communities to thrive.
The Child-Rich Community Practices
Engagement
Work inclusively and without judgement. See local people as the greatest asset, not a ‘problem to be fixed’. Proactively reach out and involve families, whānau and the wider community in discussions and decision making.
Collaboration
Work together with multiple stakeholders to maximise energy, impact and resources. Make sure local whānau and community leaders are authentically involved and supported to participate.
Empowerment
Go beyond ‘social service delivery’, proactively work alongside local people in ways that encourage them to participate, lead, make decisions and take action themselves. Encourage people to recognise their own power and help ignite their dreams and aspirations.
Relationship focus
Value and nurture strong, respectful, reciprocal and long- term relationships with families, whānau and the wider community.
To think & work holistically
If families and whānau are well, children are well. If our whānau, families and children are well, our communities will be too.
Connection
Build on the positives first and be welcoming. Use soft doors (e.g. coffee groups, local events) to strengthen social connectedness and build trust. Look to link people and ideas with others who can help, explore shared visions and next steps. Seek to build community in all you do.
Responsiveness
Be willing to change and adapt how things are done to enable the aspirations of local families, whānau and the wider community.
What does Community-led action mean?
Every community is different. Local people know best what their whānau and their community need - not someone from the outside.
Big change comes from supporting and enabling communities to thrive. This means empowering locals to decide what solutions will work best for them, sharing power, decision-making and resources so that more locally-led responses and activities can happen.
It is about supporting ground-up leadership and self-organising to improve tamariki and whānau wellbeing, through using and growing local community resources, skills, wisdom, strengths and relationships.
It’s a way of working that is driven by a set of practices that enable people, groups, organisations and places to make positive changes for themselves, their children, their family and the wider community.
Our Theory of Change
The Inspiring Communities community-led development Theory of Change shows how the process works to make a difference locally. It begins with the understanding that all communities have the ability to thrive and that effective change is dynamic. There’s no perfect ‘straight line’ plan to achieving outcomes, the pathway will be different depending on each community’s circumstances, resources, strengths and abilities.
With the right support and investment in critical phases, loose connections between local parents, leaders, community groups and supportive organisations can build into bigger, bolder collaborative action involving more people, partners and possibilities.
The CRC project builds on this rationale: collectively, we are seeking to support local people, places and organisations so that they can share, learn from, and be inspired by each other.
There are no top-down approaches here. It is about doing, learning and adapting over time.
Child-focused and community-led approaches are the key to empowering community action for improving wellbeing for all tamariki, rangatahi and whānau, locally and nationally.
