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A Letter from Kostas Skordas, ARC Staff
This is to provide you further details about the ARC's Technical Assistance to Distressed Counties Wrap-up Workshop for Southern Appalachian Communities. The workshop will be held on November 24-25 at the Plymouth Bluff Center of the Mississippi University for Women in Columbus, Mississippi. The workshop will officially begin at 12 PM on the 24th and finish by 12:00 PM on the 25th. Note that consultants should plan on being at the event by 11AM on the 24th for a pre-workshop overview. Directions to the workshop can be found at http://www.plymouthbluff.com.
Attached is the workshop final agenda for your review and preparation. The purpose of the wrap-up workshop is threefold: To REPORT and ASSESS what we've accomplished thus far, to STRENGTHEN resources for future success and momentum, and to LEARN from the experiences of others who have undertaken similar endeavors. All communities have exciting results to share, and we look forward to hearing from each of them.
Facilitating the two-day workshop will be Mr. Sherwood Shankland of Shankland & Associates, of Fairfax, Virginia. Senior facilitator, Mr. Shankland brings outside objectivity, professional facilitation expertise and over 25 years of experience working with community development and organizational planning programs. He has been actively involved in designing and preparing the upcoming workshop along with ARC staff.
Feel free to bring pictures, articles, brochures, etc. to illustrate community success. Community members will report on results during the mapping exercise on Day 1. They will visually represent their journey thus far (on a large wall-sized piece of paper) identifying critical issue(s) and community needs, with common symbols corresponding to meetings, obstacles, breakthroughs and milestones in the process. Some questions for preparation include:
*What have you accomplished thus far?
*What breakthroughs assisted you in overcoming obstacles?
*Were there any unexpected side effects (positive or negative) of your effort?
*How have you encouraged local support and diverse participation?
*Where are you going from here?
Take note that after community reporting, consultants will discuss available resources found for each of the communities (funding sources, local fundraising, volunteer opportunities, mentoring opportunities and other technical assistance). The evening's activities will consist of dinner followed by small group exercises on leadership. Day two is reserved for capacity assessment to implement the community's selected project(s), address the critical issue(s) and focus on external needs in the coming years.
If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to call me. Thanks again for your continued support!
We look forward to seeing you at the workshop.
Regards,
Kostas Skordas
ARC Regional Planning and Research
202-884-7720
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