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Action
Research: links to online resources on Action Research
Action research is a systematic form of inquiry that is collective, collaborative,
self-reflective, critical, and undertaken by the participants of the inquiry
[McCutcheon, G. & Jung, B. (1990). Alternative perspectives on action
research. Theory into Practice 29 (3): 144-151]. Action research, sometimes
called "practitioner research," is a reflective investigation
of a personal interest, problem or challenge. The process begins with
the development of questions, which may be answered by the collection
of data. Action implies that the practitioner will be acting as the collector
of data, the analyst, and the interpreter of results.
Action
Research
This site provides an introduction to action research as well as links
to other Action Research sites
- Action Research Defined (Florida Atlantic University)
- What is Action Research? (Pathways)
- Action Research Resources (Bob Dick)
- What is Action Research? (Beverly Johnson)
- Action Research links (Daniel Robertson)
- Corollary sites (that reference this page)
Canadian Research
Institute for the Advancement of Women
COMM-ORG The On-Line Conference
On Community Organizing and Development
Community-Based Participatory Research.
Community-Campus Partnerships for Health (CCPH)
CCPH has developed a number of tools
and resources for community-based participatory research.
Following is the outline of the contents:
Overview
Tools and Resources
Reports and Presentations
Peer-Reviewed Journal Articles
Syllabi and Course Materials
Electronic Discussion Groups
Web Links
Principles and Policies
Call for Papers
In the spring of 2000, Community-Campus Partnerships for Health commissioned
a paper on community-based participatory research and the policy issues
affecting such research. Click here to
view and print the paper.
Flett Consulting Group Inc./Social Data Research Ltd, Evaluating
the Feasibility of Introducing a Retractable Safety Syringe for Use by
Ottawa Needle Exchange Program (NEP) Clients. City of Ottawa, Health
Department, 2003.
Kaye Seymour-Rolls & Ian Hughes, Participatory
Action Research: Getting the Job Done. Action
Research Open Web AROW. The University of Sydney. 1995, 2000. Contents
Table of Contents
Introduction
The Moments by Definition
The Moments by Method
A possible PAR project
Conclusion
References
Linda Mayoux, Thinking
It Through: Using Diagrams in Impact Assessment. August 2003
This paper significantly updates and expands an earlier paper of the same
title and complements a number of other papers on this web site (see Participatory
Methods, Empowering Enquiry). It draws substantially on current work by
the author and Kabarole Research and Resource Centre (KRC) in Western
Uganda to pilot a methodology called PALS (Participatory Action Learning
System) which uses diagram methods at all levels to link grassroots learning
with programme decision-making and national level advocacy.
OESP Handbook Series, Who
Are the Question-makers? A Participatory Evaluation Handbook
(Editorial Board: Sharon Capeling-Alakija, Carlos Lopes, Abdenour Benbouali
and Djibril Diallo - Managing Editor: Janet Donnelly) . OESP, 1997. Office
of Evaluation and Strategic Planning, United Nations Development Programme.
Participatory
Evaluation online information compiled by L. Coffin. This site, dedicated
to Participatory Evaluation, provides link to topics such as:
- What is Participatory Evaluation?
- How is it done?
- What have other organizations done?
- Other resources!
Participatory
Evaluation: a guide and entry way to some of the many resources on
the subject of participatory evaluation.
This particular webpage organizes the concept into five (somewhat overlapping)
categories, representing participatory evaluation as:
- related to action research and community-based research;
- a tool of participatory development, especially international development
rendered in human services;
- part of a trio of approaches as framed by the evaluation field's professional
association in the U.S.; and
- related to community indicators.
For each of the PE perspectives noted above, this guide identifies two
types of relevant web-based materials, an overview, and gateways to resources.
Those sites selected for overviews are ones which describe or introduce
participatory evaluation from one of each of the chosen perspectives.
Gateway sites are ones which take the researcher to particularly rich
collections of resources, most of which entail materials in both related
theory and practice, often including how-to manuals. Brief annotations
are given for each site.
Partnership for the Public's Health, Participatory
Evaluation: What is it? Why do it? What are the challenges?. April
2002
This brief lays out a framework for understanding the special nature of
participatory evaluation, comparing and contrasting it with more traditional
forms of evaluation; gives a rationale for its use; provides a short,
step-by-step set of instructions on how to implement this approach; and
then offers real-world examples of the challenges and rewards in applying
the principles of participatory evaluation. Developed by the Partnership
for the Public's Health.
Robin McTaggart, 16 Tenets
of Participatory Action Research. The
Caledonia Centre
for Social Development (1989).
The 16 tenets of Participatory Action Research outlined in this short
note were presented to the 3er Encuentro Mundial Investigacion Participatva
(The Third World Encounter on Participatory Research), Managua, Nicaragua,
September 3 – 9, 1989. They represent an important reflection and
distillation of the praxis of participatory action research, by one of
its leading practitioners, during the 1980s. The Caledonia Centre for
Social Development, as part of its on-going work in the field of participatory
development, wishes to make these tenets accessible to a new generation
of social activists and to re-stimulate older practitioners.
Success
Measures Guidebook version 1.0 Online. Development Leadership Network.
December 1999.
The Guidebook contains 44 indicators and a step-by-step guide for engaging
community members to use them for participatory planning and evaluation.
Susan Saegert, Lymari Benitez, Efrat Eizenberg, Tsai-shiou Hsieh, and
Mike Lamb, Participatory
Evaluation: How It Can Enhance Effectiveness and Credibility of Nonprofit
Work City University of New York Graduate Center. Spring 2004
This article is written from an evaluator’s point of view and although
the examples focus on community-based organizations, they illustrate broader
lessons about accountability, evaluation and participation that should
prove useful to any nonprofit leader
Asset-based
Community Development
ABCD is a community-driven developmental process that focuses
on mobilizing individual and community talents, skills and assets. It
is an approach to development that works on many different levels to promote
well-being and quality of life for people and their communities.
Asset-Based
Community Development Institute (ABCD), established in 1995 by the
Community Development Program at Northwestern University's Institute for
Policy Research, is built upon three decades of community development
research by John Kretzmann and John L. McKnight.
The ABCD Institute spreads its findings on capacity-building community
development in two ways: (1) through extensive and substantial interactions
with community builders, and (2) by producing practical resources and
tools for community builders to identify, nurture, and mobilize neighborhood
assets.
Click here
to view the Topic Index to ABCD Publications
Click
here to access the list of the Workbooks
Center for Collaborative
Planning (CCP) promotes health and social justice by providing training
and technical assistance and by connecting people and resources.
CCP supports diverse communities in key areas, such as:
Asset-based
Community Development (ABCD)
Leadership Development
Working Collaboratively
Community Assessment and Strategic Planning
Community
Change Education Project, University of Wisconsin-Madison & Extension
The first-step goal of this site is to provide materials to Extension
workers and others in the forefront of community change efforts. The modules
below are intended to enhance capacity to do effective community change
education.
The second-step goal is for these educators-as-catalysts, in a deliberative
way, to share this enhanced capacity with citizens-at-large in their neighborhoods,
communities, and organizations.
The third-step goal is for these citizens to take on more of their own
business, whatever may be the issues of concern. The issues of public
importance are many and complex. Resolving these concerns can use as many
hands and heads as good community change education might provide.
Click
here to access various tools and publications on Asset-Based Community
Development (ABCD) such as:
- ABCD Explored
- ABCD DOs and DONTs
- ABCD Step-by-Step
- ABCD Process & Tools Box
- ABCD Assessment
- Learning Styles & Experiential Education
- Community Problem-Solving Process
- Community-Level Power Analysis
- Community Participatory Research
- Building Community Collaboratives
- Concept Papers
Connecticut Assets Network
(CAN) is a grassroots nonprofit network of citizens and organizations
that promote the integration and successful use of asset-based strategies
for community development.
The "asset approach" uses the resources and assets of individuals,
organizations and communities as the building blocks of successful health
promotion strategies. Rather than exclusively looking at problems, deficits,
and weaknesses as the focus of program planning, citizens and community
policy makers focus on building upon their strengths by discovering and
developing their resources.
CAN believes in the notion that for communities to build protective factors
(resiliency and assets) in the lives of our youth and families, they need
guidance, support and networking. The key is networking through conversation
(capacity surveys) and work (projects) to develop asset-rich relationships
where people discover their many gifts, talents, and capacities for mutually
beneficial problem solving. Environments wherein citizen development and
contribution are practiced are the foundation for sustained solutions
to problems, and as such are widely recognized as a key to developing
healthy youth and communities.
Connecticut Assets Network (CAN), Community
Capacity Building Glossary: What is all this jargon?
Every field has its words and the field of assets based community development
is no different. Words like assets that usually refer to balance sheets
take on an entirely new meaning when applied to people and communities.
We hope this listing of words is helpful.
Gord Cunningham and Alison Mathie, Asset-Based
Community Development -- An Overview
Coady International Institute.
Human
Resources Development Canada, Innovation and Learning For Canadians Office
of Learning Technologies
This site provides access to various research reports funded by the Office
of Learning Technologies (OLT) Program through its Community Learning
Networks (CLN) Initiative
The Office
of Learning Technologies (OLT) provides funding to Canadian organizations
to expand innovative learning opportunities through technology. The opportunities
facilitate adult learning and skills development in order to enable Canadians
to fully participate in the workplace and their community.
Community
Learning Networks (CLN) Initiative is an OLT funding initiative.It
supports community-based pilot projects that demonstrate innovative and
sustainable uses of existing network technologies to upgrade skills and
knowledge in Canadian communities. These community-based approaches help
individuals to prepare for and keep employment and to participate in a
culture of lifelong learning.
Community Learning Networks:
- Use technology as a tool to support and enable learning, skills development
and networking;
- Have a thorough understanding of skills and learning opportunities
and needs gained through the creation of a community-based inventory
of learning assets and gaps;
- Demonstrate strong community participation through partnerships with
the public, university/college, voluntary and/or private sectors;
- Promote individual and community development
John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight "Building
Communities from the Inside Out: A Path Toward Finding and Mobilizing
a Community's Assets".Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern
University, 1993.
This guide to what the authors call "asset-based community development"
summarizes lessons learned by studying successful community-building initiatives
in hundreds of neighborhoods across the United States. It outlines in
simple, "neighborhood-friendly" terms what local communities
can do to start their own journey down the path of asset-based development.
This book will be helpful to local community leaders, leaders of local
associations and institutions, government officials, and leaders in the
philanthropic and business communities who wish to support effective community-building
strategies.
Click here to read the Introduction to "Building
Communities from the Inside Out."
Margaret D. Slinski, Building
Communities of Support for Families in Poverty. Cooperative Extension
University of Massachusetts. 1994
This article is a manual that uses participatory research, education,
and evaluation to build sustainable communities of support in high risk
neighborhoods throughout the nation.
OECD, Asset
Building and the Escape from Poverty: A New Welfare Policy Debate
Governments in developed countries have long used, directly or indirectly
through their tax systems, policies that subsidise or otherwise encourage
the population at large to acquire assets such as financial savings, home
ownership, retirement funds, education (human capital) or business capital.
These policies seldom reach the poor. In fact, for the poor these policies
often do not stimulate saving but rather discourage it. However, the evidence
reported in this book is that the poor want to save, and can do so in
modest amounts. In fact, they will do so, often with sacrifices greater
than either policy makers or the more well-off might imagine. Extending
asset-building policies to the poor can represent an effective attack
on both poverty and economic and social alienation of the poor, because
it has positive welfare effects that income support alone cannot provide.
This book establishes the context for a fruitful debate on the merits
and demerits of asset building for the poor by setting out the basic ideas
involved in asset-building programmes and proposals. It also outlines
the social policy advantages that their proponents claim, and documents
what the existing programmes and demonstration projects look like.
Contact the author at Antonella.Noya@oecd.org
To download free of charge this publication, please visit the OECD
Online Bookshop.
Thomas Dewar, A
Guide to Evaluating Asset-Based Community Development: Lessons, Challenges,
and Opportunities. A Community Building Workbook from The Asset-Based
Community Development Institute. Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern
University, 1997.
This guide is written primarily for community-building practitioners from
the point of view of an experienced evaluator, but it should also be useful
for funders and others who would like to be helpful to community builders.
This document seeks to provide some guidance about how evaluation strategies
can actually improve the work of community builders. It identifies and
clarifies some of the most important issues and dilemmas that come up
on trying to evaluate community-building projects and suggests ten important
principles for those wishing to implement evaluation strategies which
are appropriate for this work.
Susy Cheston, Lisa Kuhn, Empowering
women through microfinance. Washington DC, USA: Microcredit Summit
Campaign. 2002
This paper looks at some of the theories and assumptions behind targeting
women for microfinance and their implications for empowerment. Drawing
on the studies and experiences of microfinance institutions in Africa,
Asia, and Latin America, the paper looks at what evidence there is of
impact on women in terms of welfare and empowerment. Although there is
no set of indicators of empowerment that can be applied universally across
cultures and regions, the authors present evidence of several types of
changes that are relevant and important for empowerment across a range
of cultures. The paper looks at the case study of the impact on women
of Sinapi Aba Trust (SAT), Opportunity International's partner in Ghana.
Based on this study several programmatic factors and strategies are identified
that can make a positive contribution to women's empowerment and holistic
transformation. The paper finally looks at strategies used by MFIs for
reaching and empowering women and their results, identifying some of the
most promising.
Youth
Community Asset Mapping Report. Environmental Youth Alliance. 2003.
Prepared by Wei Hsi Hu, (with reports from Jackie Amsden, Nadim Kara,
K.K. Law, Diane Macleod, Kristin Pattern, Tammie Tupechka)
The Youth Community Asset Mapping initiative (formerly known as "Rediscovering
Vancouver, Rediscovering Ourselves") arose following consultations
with youth through
the Vancouver Windows of Opportunity (1998 - 2001), a community consultation
with
inputs from youth, parents, and service providers, and through a United
Way funded
youth community consultation in 2000. These processes indicated that a
new outreach
mechanism was needed to engage a broad range of youth and that youth desperately
wanted more invovlement opportunities available to them in their communities.
To adress this need, the Self Help Resource Association and the Environmental
Youth
Alliance worked in partnership to organize the Youth Community Asset Mapping
Initiative (YCAM).
YCAM began to use the tool of community mapping to increase the capacity
of the youth community and began, following their mandate to catalyze
the involvement of youth in meaningful social change activities and to
connect youth to existing supports and services in their communities.
This report highlights 5 of the 8 projects supported by this initiative,
discusses the health outcomes of the projects, and also explores possible
directions and potentials for Community Asset Mapping as a Population
Health Promotion tool
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