Community Engagement is the process by which citizens are engaged to work and learn together on behalf of their communities to create and realize bold visions for the future. It can involve informing citizens about your initiative, inviting their input, collaborating with them to generate solutions, and partnering with the community from the beginning to tackle community issues.
Community Engagement increases community cohesion and allows for the community to have ownership over the outcomes that will ultimately impact them.
Monday, September 30 | Building Your Planning Canvas
Why engage? It’s a simple question, but one that most people don’t spend enough time exploring. Too often we engage ‘because we’re supposed to’ rather than ‘because we absolutely need to’. In this skills session we will challenge the status quo and push our thinking beyond our comfort zone.
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Tuesday, October 1 | Innovative Stories and Case Studies
What would it take for your engagement to be truly personal, accessible and centered around connection? Explore the role of humour, informal language and vulnerability through stories and exercises, and brainstorm the possibilities for your authentic engagement.
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Wednesday, October 2 | Methods to Put Theory Into Practice
In this time of increasing polarization, it has never been more important to bring people together to share and deliberate to help create understanding between people with diverse perspectives. Deep dive into two methods for deep collaborative engagement and explore the role of the community from being the recipient of programs and services to having ownership and investment in the things that matter most to them.
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Consulting Director, Community Engagement
Tamarack learning Centre
Lisa works with cities and organizations to help them meaningfully engage their communities. Over the last six years her work has focused on creating authentic engagement strategies and training staff teams, teaching and writing about innovative engagement methodologies, designing and facilitating workshops with a focus on raising the voice of the context expert, integrated communications planning, and the use of technology and creativity for engagement. Lisa advocates for simplicity in infrastructure, frameworks and design and loves applying the principles of marketing, advertising, loyalty, and user experience to community initiatives.