 |
Topics:
Health
Citizen
Politics Reinvents Alabama County Extension's Approach to Health
In Calhoun
County, Alabama, County Extension health agents no longer "fix"
community problems. Instead, they serve as catalysts, empowering
ordinary citizens to develop solutions to the problems they experience.
The citizen politics model has been used to address health issues
from arthritis to diabetes and has altered Extension's whole approach
to health work. Story.
Story:
Citizen Politics Reinvents Alabama County Extension's Approach
to Health
After 28
years as a County Extension Agent in Calhoun County, Barbara Mobley's
discovery of Citizen Politics was like "teaching an old dog new
tricks." The new process, developed in collaboration with Project
Public Life in Minnesota, puts experts "on tap," not "on top."
It means, as she puts it, "letting go of previous methods many
Extension Agents use in prescribing a 'fix' for a community problem.
The process forces us to draw interested parties into the field
of play. We let go, give up or share the ownership, serve as a
catalyst, and ordinary people become empowered in establishing
solutions to problems."
County Extension
now applies this approach to program after program with striking
results. Instead of organizing a health council the old way by
announcing it as an Extension project, staffing important positions
themselves, and consulting occasionally only with the Health Department,
county agents made one-to-one contacts with those in the community
perceived to have the power to mobilize people and organizations
to get things done themselves. By such relationship building and
power mapping, they were then able to bring people to a luncheon
to discuss openly their own private as well as public interests
in health care in the county. From this discussion a diverse leadership
group emerged with its own fundraising capacities, and no dependence
on Extension. County agents, freed from the burnout that results
when trying to run too many needed programs, move on to catalyze
another collaborative project.
Mrs. Vera
Stewart, the mayor of Piedmont, realized that effective health
education programming in the city would require citizen involvement,
and invited County Extension agents to review the concepts of
Citizen Politics with her. She then invited other interested citizens
and town leaders to develop a strategy together. Civic Clubs,
church groups, Senior Citizens groups, and other town leaders
collaborated to develop a four-hour program and brunch, and to
bring out 175 people to the Piedmont Arthritis Seminar. Participants
helped organize an arthritis support group, with the collaboration
of the city, Extension Service, and the Jacksonville Hospital.
An Alzheimers support group brings in still other partners from
the University of Alabama and the Regional Medical Center.
Extension
agents have also catalyzed a county-wide partnership among three
hospitals, Extension Services and the Health Department, and provided
leadership training in Citizen Politics for several diabetes patients
to serve as volunteer managers of a diabetes support group, and
the state's first Diabetes Camp for Adults. The volunteers take
full responsibility with their committee for all programming,
and actively solicit input from citizen stakeholders to identify
problems and solutions. The five agencies and citizen stakeholders
feel equal ownership, and provide the kind of support that frees
Extension agents from attending meetings. And so they move on
to yet another empowerment project, such as the Calhoun Women's
Empowerment Network, which provides leadership training to low-
and moderate-income women. The core leadership group from school
boards and other groups has enlisted five banks to sponsor luncheons
and monthly meetings at the banks, and has enlisted various agency
partners to provide them with a public policy tour of the State
Capitol. Extension agents again move on.
More
Information
Barbara Mobley
Calhoun County Extension
205-237-1621.
Back to Health Index
|
