Art and Community Capacity-Building

Author(s):  
Ferdinand Lewis ◽  
Eleanor K. Sommer

Arts programs are increasingly becoming part of public engagement in the context of community health but have mostly been studied in urban and suburban locations. This chapter outlines a successful partnership between an arts in healthcare program and a community health coalition in rural Franklin County, Florida, an area struck by natural and human-made disasters. During a five-year period, the organizations worked in partnership to address the “fragmentation” of the community and its health services and to build community and organizational capacity for public health planning using the arts. The partnership sustained engagement with a variety of communities and institutions in Franklin County, Florida, conducted community assessments, developed public murals and mosaics, created community gardens, gathered stories, and employed Boalian theater strategies. The case study examines the partnership through the lens of a “Community Coalition Action Theory” framework, offering a narrative of a unique partnership (Butterfoss & Kegler, 2002).

Societies ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 64
Author(s):  
Crystal Taylor ◽  
Qinghong Wei

Creating social connections and fostering engagement in communities is a growing challenge for community work. Planners, social workers, and community activists are starting to look towards the arts and storytelling as a way to promote community capacity. A community in Lopez Island, Washington, facing sustainable housing and agricultural issues brought in a two-day storytelling and theatre program to build capacity for their ecosocial work. This research describes facilitator engagement methodology and pilots a community capacity survey to evaluate the experience of workshop participants. Preliminary results show that the storytelling program makes strides in deepening connections to others and generating authentic dialogue. Participants reported both positive experiences of building trust and negative feelings of vulnerability. As funding can be a major barrier for community groups to incorporate arts programs, this research introduces a preliminary survey that communities can adapt and improve upon to help them start gathering evidence-based data for assessing measures of community capacity. Though the facilitators brought unique theatrical and choreographic skills to the programming, planners and social workers can take away for practice a simple storytelling exercise that participants enthusiastically expressed fostered listening, trust, and connection.


2021 ◽  
pp. 1321103X2110325
Author(s):  
Katrina Skewes McFerran ◽  
Alexander HD Crooke ◽  
Megan Steele ◽  
John Hattie ◽  
Gary E McPherson

Arts programs are increasingly recognized for their role in promoting student development and cohesive school communities. Yet, most Australian schools are left to navigate a landscape characterized by shifting policy goals and external providers of diverse quality and intent. Drawing on interviews with 27 stakeholders from 19 Catholic primary schools in Melbourne, Australia, we explored key approaches to arts provision in this context, and conditions that hinder and support it. Approaches varied markedly, from school-wide programs embedded across the curriculum, to one-off incursions. Conditions consistently affecting provision ranged from leadership support to a community’s view of the arts. Programs regularly relied on individuals passionate about arts to go beyond their paid roles, yet this frequently jeopardized sustainability. Overall, the approaches identified, and conditions affecting their sustainability, reveal a lack of value for school arts at policy and administration levels. This lack of value is not demonstrated in the provision of other traditional school activities like math or literacy, which begs consideration by policymakers and school administrators.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bougangue Bassoumah ◽  
Andani Mohammed Adam ◽  
Martin Nyaaba Adokiya

Abstract Background The Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) is a national health reform programme that provides healthcare at the doorsteps of rural community members, particularly, women and children. It seeks to reduce health inequalities and promote equity of health outcomes. The study explored implementation and utilization challenges of the CHPS programme in the Northern Region of Ghana. Methods This was an observational study that employed qualitative methods to interview key informants covering relevant stakeholders. The study was guided by the systems theory. In all, 30 in-depth interviews were conducted involving 8 community health officers, 8 community volunteers, and 14 women receiving postnatal care in four (4) CHPS zones in the Yendi Municipality. The data were thematically analysed using Atlas.ti.v.7 software and manual coding system. Results The participants reported poor clinical attendance including delays in seeking health care, low antenatal and postnatal care visits. The barriers of the CHPS utilization include lack of transportation, poor road network, cultural beliefs (e.g. taboos of certain foods), proof of women’s faithfulness to their husbands and absence of health workers. Other challenges were poor communication networks during emergencies, and inaccessibility of ambulance service. In seeking health care, insured members of the national health insurance scheme (NHIS) still pay for services that are covered by the NHIS. We found that the CHPS compounds lack the capacity to sterilize some of their equipment, lack of incentives for Community Health Officers and Community Health Volunteers and inadequate infrastructures such as potable water and electricity. The study also observed poor coordination of interventions, inadequate equipment and poor community engagement as setbacks to the progress of the CHPS policy. Conclusions Clinical attendance, timing and number of antenatal and postnatal care visits, remain major concerns for the CHPS programme in the study setting. The CHPS barriers include transportation, poor road network, cost of referrals, cultural beliefs, inadequate equipment, lack of incentives and poor community engagement. There is an urgent need to address these challenges to improve the utilization of CHPS compounds and to contribute to achieving the sustainable development goals.


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pedro Luz Pinto ◽  

Álvaro Siza Vieira (1933) began his training at the Architecture Department of the School of Fine Arts in Porto (EBAP) in 1949, one year after the 1st Congress of Portuguese Architects (1948), which became known as the congress of modern architects. There were two fine arts schools at the time in Portugal, in Porto and Lisbon (EBAP and EBAL), both with an equivalent curriculum that was coordinated by the state. Siza attended the course based on the “beaux arts” programs of 1932, concluding the curricular part of his course in 1955 and presenting his final graduation design in 1965. But by this time, Portuguese education in the arts had already switched to “modern”curricula (1952-57 Reform). The following year, having already seen some of his important works built, Siza began his career as assistant professor at the school in Porto.


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