Kretzmann and McKnight Flowcharts
Issue/Needs-Based Pathway: This chart shows the perspective of the “outside help” of those being served, first from the usual approach and secondly from a suggested approach. Often times the volunteers preforming service go into projects and trips with good intentions and thinking they understand the situation they’re walking into. Sometimes they’ve been educated, but sometimes they haven’t. We compare what we’ve heard about the site we’re visiting to our own lives and often attach pity to our feelings of the place we’re going to serve. Regardless, you can’t fully understand a situation until you immerse yourself in it. By volunteering, we can learn more about the area we’re in and the people in that area, and by understanding more we can then learn how to help the situation in the long run, not just for the duration of a service trip.
Assets-Based Pathway: This chart shows the effects of assets and the community benefits they can have. Assets can be valuable in building communities or bettering one’s that already exist. Many problems are constantly occurring in communities across the country, and even across the world, and assets can be put in place to better certain issues. Volunteers can be very helpful, and can make a difference for sure, but combining assets and volunteers is ideal. Often assets are things that must be obtained or developed, and volunteers can be of help in this respect. Creating youth programs in a community, for example, might not be easy, but with the help of volunteers these types of assets can be developed, and thus the Assets-Based pathway can be put into effect to better communities.