2nd Semester Community Engagement, Solidarity, and

Citizenship
Lesson 8
Mapping the Community

I. Preliminaries

I. Objectives

A. Content Standard: The learners demonstrate an understanding of the

integration of social science perspective and community action initiatives

B. Performance Standard: The learners shall be able to synthesize the

integrative experience of implementing community-action initiatives applying
social sciences’ ideas and methods

C. Learning Competencies:
Recognize diversities in communities

II. Content

Community Engagement, Solidarity, and Citizenship

Lesson: Societal Typologies
 2nd Semester Community Engagement, Solidarity, and
Citizenship
Lesson 8
Mapping the Community

CONCEPT NOTES

Introduction

Studying the community demands more than basic knowledge of

concepts. Scholars should be more adept about the relationships of real-
world variables and how they fit into the concepts they have learned.

Community development is interdisciplinary; it needs more than just a

linear knowledge of meaning but a holistic understanding of real-world
problems, grounded solutions, and boundless ideas for inspired action.

Engagement

Resilient

Sustainability Planning

Progressive Accountable

Adaptable Vigilant

Development Implementation

Dynamic Social Development Model

 COMMUNITY VIRTUES

A community embodies a personality derived from its members. The

virtues that people embody cascade to the community as a whole. To be part
of the community, one has to imbibe critical virtues for him or her to
effectively facilitate change and social development. Like what we have
discussed, we create meaning and we are enablers of progress. Everything
starts with us and we take our community with us as we pursue our personal
goals. It is our duty to be part of the change we seek. It is our obligation to
serve our fellow men and such obligation starts with our intention to be part
of a movement. The figure above represents the virtues and initiatives that
ideally are the blueprints of a holistic development paradigm. It includes an
end-to-end mapping of community processes from planning to sustainability.
Juxtaposing these with the virtues, we can draw a more concise, efficient,
and effective development map for the community.

Resilient Communities

Droughts, floods, heat waves, earthquakes, forest fires, and tsunamis

are just a few of the challenges from Mother Nature that our communities
face. Corruption, red tape, crime, terrorism, and human rights abuses, on the
other hand, are some of the problems that are man-made and are a result of
greed, dishonesty, and man's insatiable appetite for power. Despite these
C challenges, we strive to survive and continue with our daily lives. Just like a
living organism, communities are attacked by

threats that endanger the whole system. And just like the natural ability of
the organism to react, anticipate, and recuperate against attacks, the
communities can also fight off these threats. Finally, just like the organism,
the community develops and evolves to learn and block such threats in the
future.

Resiliency is the ability of the community to get back on its feet after a
calamity and continue with its existence. The virtue of resiliency is our
inherent drive to survive and live our lives to its full potential. Filipinos are
renowned for this resiliency, having withstood the strongest typhoon ever
recorded in human history and floods that would have incapacitated cities for
months. The Filipino community has been as resilient as the bamboo plant
withstanding gusts of wind. Nowadays' challenges, both man-made and
otherwise, are interrelated along with our choices and our social dynamic as
a whole.
 Resiliency is still not enough for us to ensure the survivability of our
own commune. More than surmounting the odds, we need to learn and
recalibrate our structures, beliefs, and patterns of behavior to prepare
ourselves for the upcoming

challenges ahead. Our history, more than any theory or law, brings us the
awareness that our resiliency in the past provides us the roadmap to
success.

For our communities to be resilient, social cohesion is essential. Every

member of the community should be bound by communal spirit and duty to
serve more than the self but the other.

Vigilant Communities

We are accustomed to the everyday grind in our community. However,

we have been so blind about getting to know our own communities. Let us
be honest, most of us know more about the most recent fashion trends than
the barangay ordinances or even the national issues affecting the barangay.
We fall flat on our duty to observe and appreciate the very systems that
govern our lives. We only have limited knowledge about the state of our
community and even the issues concerning our fellow men and women
because we fail to appreciate and understand how things really are around
us. Without such knowledge and appreciation, we are disconnected and
apathetic to the calls of our society. Our community needs us and we can do
our part by being informed and being vigilant to our current situation.

Vigilance is more than just being awake and alert to avoid dangers of
C problems, In community development, vigilance is the sustained assessment
of not just threats or danger but of progressive ideas and solutions. It is not
merely guarding the gates of the status quo but is also challenging the
norms that are needed to be changed, altered, or developed further. The
problem about the old notion of vigilance is that it is trapped by

the meaning of compliance. By doing so, we end up with a community that

merely upholds the dogma of the past. A community should sustain a
watchful eye on the missteps and shortcomings of the current social model.
In this definition, vigilance takes on a more progressive base.

The community and its members should be relentless in redefining the

status quo in order to create discourses and groundbreaking solutions. This
is not to say that we should completely leave our customs and long-held
traditions behind. We only have to reassess who we really are and where our
communities are at present. Without acknowledging our present situation
 with a more objective eye, we, as a community, will be left with an illusion
that we create for ourselves. Since we are all creators of meaning, the very
standards held by our society cannot be just blamed on one person or a
group, but on all of us. The progress or the lack thereof of our community is
driven by our choices. These are not life-changing or fate-altering choices;
these are the

simple choices that we make every day, from falling in line, throwing our
trash, to reading the news that affects us and our communities.

Progressive Communities

What can you say about the status quo? Right now, can you think
about three adjectives to describe the communities we live in? A lot of those
words that come from your thoughts are negative. If so, despite having this
kind of mindset, why do you think that many of our fellow citizens choose to
remain complacent and inactive? Many have debated on this and just by
looking at posts on social media, you will notice multitudes of debates on
various ideas.

Change is inevitable in our communal lives. Realities of the present will

only continue with the reinforcement of behavior from actors within it.
However, some change will not be beneficial to the stakeholders, just as not
all movements are needed and essential to community development.

Going back to the virtue of vigilance, we learned that assessing the

current situation is essential for community growth. Since without self-
evaluation, we are stuck with the status quo and we fail to acknowledge
spaces for improvement.
C
Progress demands forward thinking. Foresight is an important virtue
for communities to develop, especially in this age when societies need
forward mobilization to keep up with the dynamic shifts in institutions and
structures. To be progressive means to challenge and have new ways of
thinking. Contrasting this with the virtue of vigilance, progress is about
action not reassessment. To be progressive is to act on ideas; it is to change
the status quo by anticipating future trends. Vigilant communities strive to
avert and solve recurring problems, while progressive communities strive to

avert future problems by creating innovative schemes and ideas that will
further enhance and keep up with changes in its environment. This kind of
thinking demands innovative ways of thinking. Innovative solutions come
from progressive ideas. Taking risks in advancing current thought is the only
way for us to test new assumptions and find solutions that will matter not
only today but also in the future. A community, to be progressive, will not
only include the leadership but also tap the combined knowledge and
experience of its own members. Synergy is important for ideas to flourish
and take root. Ideas that are arbitrarily made without the consultation of the
community will be hollow and will not connect to their target beneficiaries.
This is to say that social capital is important; people are important and the
relationship of leaders to their constituents is critical in advancing critical
thought. Change will only create impact with the support of the people. Any
progressive or groundbreaking initiative needs the participation of

groups and individuals. Together, we need to continuously challenge and

critique the present, for this is the only way that we can advance as a
community.

Adaptive Communities

Organisms have survived thousands of years of evolution because of

their adaptive behaviors. To be adaptive is not about sitting through a
thousand years and wait for the environment to take its course; it is about,
as any virtue, being able to face challenges and obstacles and making a
choice.

There will be challenges and problems, but the success of the

community will always be hinged on the will of its people to adapt, go
beyond their confines, and conquer all threats to the community. While
innovation is needed for progress, ingenuity and inventiveness are vital for
the community to be adaptive to its surroundings. Compared with progress,
adaptability deals more with the present condition and what is readily
available to mitigate or solve the problem. Progress, on the other hand, is
long-term as it is targeted to a forward-thinking mindset that anticipates
future events and repercussions,

Adaptability challenges the community to be creative and finds new

ways of planning Implementing, and sustaining growth. This virtue supports
all basic principles of community development as it is the enabler for
concepts to take and It opens up to unorthodox ways of solving our society's
most pressing issues and concerns. The present context calls adaptability on
all sectors and all aspects of life. From the top of the governance hierarchy
down to the members of the community, adaptability should be echoed and
Internalized by all actors. The ability to change course and act quickly on
problems are the results of the nature and openness to adaptive calibrations
of behavior, polley, and other norms. on
 The challenge for some communities is how to deal with the change
caused by adaptations. Some argue that changing the old ways will be
detrimental and conservatism would be best to protect the identity of the
group or integrity of the process. This may be true in some contexts; it still
calls for us to accept deliberate changes aimed at solving the very root of
the problem. While it is not bad to be conservative, such as in the case of
protecting our culture and history, any organization or collective should be
ready to adapt according to the needs of its surroundings. Without accepting
change, communities will not thrive in their new environment, or in extreme
cases, they will risk their own survival in the bigger narrative of society.

We learned in biology through the concept of evolution that the natural

progression of nature is change. The only way for us to survive is to
constantly seek, prepare, and change depending on the demands of our
environment, in the same

manner as our communities need to be vigilant, progressive, and adaptable

to the current social milieu.

Accountable Communities

Community development is reflective, meaning, all we input as people

in the community will be reflected back to us. In the same manner as the old
saying "trash in. trash out," we hold the choice in what we input and accept
to be real. We have been driving the point that communities are everyone's
concern. In reality, however, not all of us can see that they are responsible
for and accountable to the things that are happening at present. Remember
again that we are creators of meaning and with that power, we have a
responsibility that goes along with this potential. Our duty as creators is to
be accountable for our actions and to take our obligation to review ourselves.

Accountable communities that are objective and reasonable have a

clearer picture of their existence. Having a better understanding of their
status quo will also help them in envisioning a future through careful
planning, execution, and review of their initiatives and projects. Actually, in
community development, what is often overlooked is the review of targets
and goals after projects are carried out. A review of a stakeholders impact
and accounting for mobilized funds are just few of the important matters
where the virtue of accountability is most important.
C
From planning to execution and review, accountability should be
present in every process to ensure the integrity of the project. Ethics should
always be a priority of any kind of social process along with accountability to
safeguard the stakeholders from corrupt practices. Accountability is more
than writing the right data or encoding the right sum.
 Accountability is an ideal of ownership. To own one's identity, for
example, is a kind of ownership and thus, we are accountable for our own
actions. In the same manner, we have to take ownership over everything in
our community because it is part of our lives and we are subject to its fluxes
and changes.

Once we accept this reality of ownership, we become aware that what

we see is within us and empowers us to make conscious decisions and
efforts to alter the wrongs that we see at the present time. We can all start
by reviewing ourselves and being accountable for our simplest actions. Then,
we can be more resilient, vigilant, progressive, adaptive, and accountable to
ourselves and our communities.

FIVE-POINT COMMUNITY INITIATIVES

The figure on page 96 not only represents the virtues but also the
processes that a community undergoes to fulfill its ideas to reality. Capacity-
building measures are not a simple one-step process. If you notice inside the
figure, surrounding the virtues are the community initiatives. This implies
that the initiatives must embody the five virtues for the community to
optimize its potential social impact. While the initiatives may seem linear, it
is highly contextual or is dependent on the status of the issue or concern to
be addressed.

Note that not all problems start from the same plane. Some concerns
have varied needs to be addressed by first diagnosing the context before
curing the malady or social problem at hand. There will be problems that
have had prior progress that must be implemented or developed; while there
may be other issues that still need to be incubated through engagement and
planning. The difference between issues therefore may vary from case to
case and may start off not from zero but from a point that only needs to be
recalibrated or changed. Knowing the difference between social concerns is
important for the community to determine its course of action.

Change will always be constant in our lives in the community. This is

why on the said figure, community initiatives move around the virtues at
C certain points. By using this cyclical model, we can judge whether our
initiatives to engage, plan, implement, develop, or sustain have the right
virtues to effect sustainable growth and development in the community
impact. After reaching a point of consistent results, programs still need to be
 constantly monitored and evaluated by the stakeholders of the community.
Some adjustments may be made in anticipation of future events and issues
that bring us back to another engagement: thus, the cycle begins anew.

Engagement

Community engagement is all about connecting to the community

and its people. Methods such as key informant interviews, focus group
discussions, or surveys can contribute to our engagement with the
community. Knowing the current pulse of the community can help
community leaders determine the pressing problems that need to be
addressed. This method is important especially for community researchers
who are alien to the community that he or she is studying. As a researcher,
you have to be objective and impartial to your subject community. You
should be without bias and look at the variables detached from any
prejudice. You can employ participatory observations to aid you in this
regard. Field researchers spend ample time to immerse themselves in their
subject community. Immersion in the subject of research is a very effective
way in overcoming bias and ethnocentrism or the strong preference of one's
norm over the other that sullies the integrity of the research result.

Planning

Planning is the next step in realizing ideas from a blueprint. It needs

not only the people who are directly affected but also experts, industry
leaders, and scholars who can contribute their knowledge and experience to
the planning. This is the stage where, normally, communities hold rounds of
discussions and meetings with community members along with external
consultants. In these meetings, the community leaders have a rundown on
all possible options and gather inputs for possible innovations and
breakthroughs that are vital in advancing solutions without disenfranchising
some stakeholders.

Implementation

After setting up plans and choosing among the viable options,

implementation is the next point of emphasis. Advancing a program from
paper to procedure is a monumental task for community leaders. In
C
operationalizing a plan, the critical processes are resource mobilization and
accounting. When we say "resource," these are not all about financial
resources alone but also people and networks. Without the public support,
social initiatives will fail and not gain substantial traction since the idea
would not gain momentum and spread to a larger audience. Financial
resources should always be supported by documents to prove that funds are
spent on priorities. Transparency should be present in all processes and
 community leaders should take the lead in being open or accessible to
information. The public, at the same time, should play their part by keeping
a keen eye and be watchful on every transaction, participate in meetings,
and volunteer in activities.

Development

Development needs foresight and progressive thinking. A project's life

will not plateau after implementation. The community should strive to
develop programs or projects that last by enhancing their processes. It
should aspire for the improvement of the project using current tools and
methods for their continuous implementation, in accordance with the shifting
demands of people and the situation. Projects must adapt to constantly
changing variables.

Sustainability

Finally, sustainability is the goal that each program aspires to reach.

In reaching this level in the cycle, the program should have passed the
rigorous standards of the public. Achieving that level of consensus from
society is hard, given the diversity of needs and standards within the
community. Sustainability can be pursued even without full oversight,
provided that it does not effect negative impact on members of a

minority or a set of priorities such as the environment. For this to happen,

systems should be in place and institutions should be partners of the
community in running a project or advocacy.

C
 2nd Semester Community Engagement, Solidarity, and
Citizenship
Lesson 8
Mapping the Community

ACTIVITY NO. 1

Directions: Give the salient features of the different community virtues and five-point
community initiatives.
Community
Virtues

Five-Point
Community
Initiatives