Understanding The Nuts And Bolts Of The Community Development Process

The goal of this paper is to discuss the role and process of community development within a social setting in distressed communities. To achieve this goal, we will define the meaning and key characteristics of a community - a geographical area with articulated boundaries or a group of people that share commonalities. These commonalities include factors such as race, religion, food, music, and where they reside. In order to make a community an effective unit, the collective must work together to overcome the challenges that they face in their neighborhoods, environment, and experiences (Mondal, 2019). Community development is a community-led effort that seeks to harness the collective knowledge and skills of community members towards identifying the needs and resources, strengths and weaknesses, to resolve existing concerns and challenges (Nurture Development, 2018). Planning for community development requires time, dedication, monitoring, and evaluation – tedious and repetitive steps that can deter many from becoming involved. The purpose of community development is to build a broad partnership and coalition within the community for improving communication, socioeconomic and environmental factors that affect the well-being of members (PeerNetBC, 2019). As activists, we believe that successfully implementing the community development process requires investment of time, dedicated, patience, communication and organizing skills, and ability to follow up and follow through on commonly defined goals and objectives. Creating and utilizing sub-committees can be beneficial for mobilizing broad-based support for the variety of demands of the community development process. We will demonstrate how the use of sub- committees can strengthen bonds, enhance communication, and build teamwork. Implementing a community development process doesn’t necessarily result in immediate growth and success; it does, however, mean putting forth both realistic long-term and short- term goals in a community setting (PeerNetBC, 2019). Firmly establishing the community development process can only increase the drive to achieve the overall goal set forth by project partners. It increases the community buy-in, boosts mobilization of assets and resources, and ensures that impact is maximized and sustainability is achieved for the long-term benefit of the community