| |
4. Exploring community asset mapping
as an exemplary
model of child and youth participation in action
Community asset mapping is one of the many
effective tools for engaging children and youth in local government.
When most of us think of maps, we imagine professional drawings
that identify and locate resources, territories, and peoples.
These maps also convey institutional power and authority.
Community mapping changes this perspective by locating a much
different source of power: children and youth.
Mapping supports local engagement by helping
children and youth chart their perspectives, ideas, needs
and visions for the community.
Community mapping is an accessible tool of
participatory action for local government that enables children
and youth to create visual representations of themselves and
their communities through images and text. Through mapmaking,
information gathered is used to address and resolve specific
local, social, economic and environmental challenges relevant
to children and youth in their communities. Maps provide an
accessible tool with which to gather perspectives and mobilize
children and youth to influence decisions that impact their
communities.
Community mapping includes the voices
of children and youth
As Driskell, author of Creating Better Cities with Children
and Youth: A Manual for Participation suggests, community
mapping “creates opportunities for young people to voice their
experiences, ideas and concerns, and encourage active listening
from other community members, including other young people.”
For example, at the United Nations Environment Program International
Children’s Conference on the Environment, held in Victoria,
Canada, a group of 400 children aged 10 －12 year from over
60 different countries engaged in community mapping to understand
and articulate their collective
voice. Working together in small groups, children began by
literally mapping themselves: they traced an outline of one
member on a piece of paper. Within the outline, they drew
and described the one environmental issue most important to
them and decided what project and action they would initiate
in their own community. Outside of the outline they described
what they wanted world leaders to do in order to address the
environmental issue. The emphasis of
this mapping exercise was to enable the children to understand
themselves as a unique collective, separate, but also linked
to the world community in general. This process further enabled
the children to recognize their shared values, concerns, roles
and responsibilities, as well as to articulate a clear set
of demands
to world leaders, presented at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable
Development.
Mapping supports strong adult- child/youth
partnerships
Community mapping creates strong adult-child/youth partnerships
by providing young people with an opportunity to share ideas
and collaborate with “enabling adults.” Enabling adults are
receptive to the input of young people and strive to ensure
child and youth participation leads to important actions within
the community. For example, in Halifax, a team of youth between
the ages of 14 to 18, supported by the HeartWood Centre for
Community Youth Development used community mapping to find
out how to make their community a better place to live. After
identifying the need to improve the grounds of a local school,
J.L. Isley high school, the youth team invited members of
the local community to help map out a plan for improving the
school grounds.
Mapping is a critical tool of peer-led
initiatives
Community mapping ensures children and youth adopt leadership
roles, working with their peers to define their own needs
and issues in the community. Mapmaking “starts with a ‘clean
slate’ so that young people themselves can define their needs
and priorities, and provide opportunities for young people
to ‘be in charge.” For example, a group of Latin youth in
Vancouver, Canada, supported
by the youth Student Commission, a local youth organization,
used mapping as a frame to organize themselves around an issue
they felt needed addressing: the unrecognized language barriers
in their community. In an entirely youth-driven effort, they
mapped out which services were Spanish-speaking; what the
services offered youth and how they could be best accessed,
thereby identifying the community gaps and strengths in this
area. Mapping provided
a way to frame and address their issues in a way that was
not overwhelming, resulting in a process that enabled youth
to take full control-from identifying the issue, to collecting
and presenting user-friendly, accessible data.
Mapping supports localized involvement
of children and youth in their communities
Community mapping begins where children and youth experience
their lives―both in terms of place and understanding. This
process allows young people to build their local knowledge
and act as co-researchers in determining the issues that impact
them. For example, in Bangalore, India, over 600 college students
participated in a comprehensive survey of 9 of Bangalore’s
wards in a project that combined the use of a new skill with
their extensive knowledge of their home places. After receiving
mapping training from Swati Ramanathan and Janaagraha volunteers,
each group of students worked for approximately one full week
to survey the use of every property as well as several street
features in the wards. Their
neighborhood maps will be used to guide the Bangalore Development
Authority (BDA) in developing the next Comprehensive Development
Plan for Bangalore and will remain as a part of the official
city records. Through mapping, youth were able to use their
extensive
knowledge base to have a voice in future community plans.
Community mapping relates to the local and
everyday experiences of children and youth. Starting with
their local area as a tangible focal point, young people identify
the urgent needs and priorities that are most relevant in
their everyday lives. For example, in Victoria, Canada, children
aged 12 and 13 worked with facilitators from GroundWorks to
map an assessment of the heath of their region during a conference
set up by the local school district and regional
health authority. The youth drew on their definitions and
experience in their neighbourhoods to identify what places
were healthy and what physical conditions contributed to healthier
living, such as restaurants, trees, and basketball courts.
Theses ideas were then assembled on a map of the region, enabling
health authorities and children to see what the children valued,
and what future health initiatives could be developed in tandem
with the schools.
Mapping as a powerful tool of participatory
engagement
Community mapping helps children and youth shape their communities,
whether through localized, on-the-ground projects, or in contributing
to the policy planning, research and setting development priorities
with local governments and institutions. As a practical and
applicable tool, community mapping embodies the participatory
principles of listening to young peoples’ voices,
supporting child/youth and adult collaboration, supporting
children and youth to assume decision-making roles, fostering
critical awareness, and promoting local knowledge and skill
sets.
As local governments work with community
mapping, they often recognize the need to combine the tool
with others such as focus groups or interviews. It may be
that community mapping is good to begin a process, to identify
children’s perspectives. This could then be used to develop
a survey or other formal methods. Central throughout is to
remain true to the dynamic process of participatory action
research to bring about change in the everyday life of children
and young people to better meet their needs and dreams.
<<
previous | next >>
|
