SMALL & MIGHTY
A Small and Mighty (SAM) network of Hawaiʻi Island community change leaders came together in March 2017 to learn more about the Collective Impact Model as a strategy process to achieve social, educational and economic wellness and began to implement the Collective Impact Feasibility Framework
The first question of the framework asks, “Is there a specific social problem in our community?”. In addition to reviewing the Aloha United Way ALICE Report, and the Economic and Community Vitality indices, the group mined several other data sources and engaged others who had done similar analysis on this topic.
To learn more about what our community was already doing, we met individually with over 30 multi-sector stakeholders across the island, and participated in several network meetings.
The purpose of the listening and outreach was two-fold: to share the Hawaiʻi Island data within the ALICE report, and to learn about past and existing poverty reduction initiatives on Hawaiʻi Island and across the State. What we learned through data coupled with the listening sessions became our call to action.
To answer these questions, Vibrant HI convened multi-sector stakeholders in East Hawaiʻi, Puna, North Hawaiʻi, West Hawaiʻi and Kaʻū. Each convening was an opportunity to share what SAM learned from the Data and Listening Teams and also present to stakeholders the possibility for social change and community transformation through a collective action approach by highlighting what other vibrant communities have achieved. Following these presentations, attendees participated in facilitated dialogue with these guiding questions:
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What does a vibrant community look like?
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Based on the above, what does our community look like now?
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What can each attendee do and what can we do together?
A total of 90 stakeholders participated in the convenings, and over 200 ideas of what a vibrant Hawaiʻi Island looks like were received. The participants sorted ideas, decided upon an overarching theme for similar ideas, and then further sorted themes into values (how we want to accomplish anything we do), and opportunities (what we want to do). Following the convenings, SAM members met and reviewed the themes from each convening, and again grouped similar ideas, decided upon overarching themes, and sorted into values and opportunites. The final 12 main ideas emerged.
The final question of the feasibility framework asks, “Is the community ready for cross sector collective action that focuses on mutually reinforcing efforts to reduce poverty?” To answer this, we brought together nearly 200 folks from across Hawaiʻi Island representing government, education, business, philanthropy, social services, faith community, and those who understand first hand the challenges that ALICE households face. Topic presentations and resources can be found under the tab Collective Action.