1.5 What can community based research achieve?
This is a story from Sawa, a Syrian organisation set up to support the first refugees arriving in the Beka’a Valley in 2011. The video features Omar Abdullah, Program Officer at Sawa and Abdel Hadi Al Assaf, from Syria, a carpenter. We recommend watching the videos with English subtitles as they contain both English and Arabic.
We hear how the organisation found out what the refugees needed, what they set up, and how it worked for the community. Their approach is illustrated by the story of one of the refugees who was able to use their support to become an independent self-employed carpenter – and now Sawa also benefits from the model he represents.
The Sawa strategy is to
- understand the needs of the community,
- support the personal development of individuals, and
- follow through to enabling their independence and wellbeing.
In turn, their support has three kinds of impact, on:
- the independence and wellbeing of the individuals they help
- their impact on the people they help, and
- the prosperity of the community as a whole.
Community research can help solve issues that a community confronts. What issues or topics do you think are worth researching in your community?
Alternatively, you can work with our suggested Research Questions (RQs):
- why do children stay away from school?
- what challenges do people experience as they travel during the day?
Perhaps you would want to modify one of them, to fit your context more closely? Or you may have your own idea. Either way, please post your idea on the Padlet.
Exercise: Padlet
Put your idea on this Padlet - all you need to do is double-click to add a virtual post-it note:
- Give a short description of the community you have in mind.
- Say what the issue is that you would like to research.
- To find out more about that issue whom would you listen to?
Make a note in your Research Notebook of the ideas in the video or the Padlet that may be useful for your own project.
Over to you
Look through the other posts on the Padlet wall, and note those you find interesting, or that are similar to your issue.
In the forum, please comment on the posts you found interesting, and offer other ideas for how to start finding out more.