Resources: Methods and Tools: Online Guides
| Title: |
Check Your Success -- A Community Guide to Developing Indicators |
| Summary: |
A manual on developing local indicators and completing evaluations. |
| Methods and Tools: |
indicator development and evaluation for economic, social, environmental, and organizational analysis |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://www.uap.vt.edu/checkyoursuccess/ |
| Title: |
Chronic Poverty Research Center Toolbox |
| Summary: |
Despite the growing consensus that poverty is multi-dimensional and complex, a lot of research is based on using approaches and methods that cannot capture a full picture. To deepen the understanding of poverty, much research needs to be multi-disciplinary and involve a mix of quantitative, qualitative and participatory approaches. This toolbox provides a guide to the variety of approaches and methods available and how they can be mixed to produce both rigorous and policy relevant research. Through identifying further resources (and especially web sites) where you can explore methodological tools and issues in greater detail, the toolbox allows researchers to check that their research designs reflect 'good practice'. The toolbox also discusses cases in which the nature of chronic poverty has a bearing on the methodological approach chosen and the way in which it is employed |
| Methods and Tools: |
situation analysis, needs assessment, feasibility study, baseline study, monitoring, evaluation, and impact assessment, policy analysis, organizational analysis; surveys, rapid appraisal, participant observation, case studies, participatory learning and action, photographic |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| URL: |
http://idpm.man.ac.uk/cprc/CPToolbox/Introduction.htm |
| Title: |
Civic Practices Network |
| Summary: |
Provides a variety of manuals and guides on community building and planning as it relates to housing, asset mobilization, strategic planning, education, and more.
Methods/Tools: healthy communities' initiatives, coalition building, visioning, strategic planning, networking, community building
|
| Methods and Tools: |
healthy communities' initiatives, coalition building, visioning, strategic planning, networking, community building |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://www.cpn.org/cpn/index.html |
| Title: |
Civic Practices Network |
| Summary: |
Provides a variety of manuals and guides on community building and planning as it relates to housing, asset mobilization, strategic planning, education, and more.
Methods/Tools: healthy communities' initiatives, coalition building, visioning, strategic planning, networking, community building
|
| Methods and Tools: |
healthy communities' initiatives, coalition building, visioning, strategic planning, networking, community building |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://www.cpn.org/cpn/index.html |
| Title: |
Community Analysis Resources on the WWW |
| Summary: |
Colorado based, but takes the user through the steps of community profiling including the questions to ask, how to answer them, and where to find the data on the web. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community assessment; economic and demographic profiling, trend analysis, community inventory |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Colorado Department of Education, Library Research Service (LRS) |
| URL: |
http://www.lrs.org/html/topics&tools/community_analysis_web.html |
| Title: |
Community Based Approaches |
| Summary: |
Offers a variety of economic, human dimension, and integrative tools (pdf). |
| Methods and Tools: |
community economic profiling, economic, environmental, and socio-cultural indicators, sense of place assessment, impact and marketing analyses |
| Applications: |
community and economic development, poverty assessment |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| Location: |
US Environmental Protection Agency |
| URL: |
http://www.epa.gov/ecocommunity/tools.htm |
| Title: |
Community Development Toolbox |
| Summary: |
The Community Development Toolbox offers an online environment where rural people pursuing community development goals are empowered to make better decisions as they solve problems facing their community. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community surveys, planning strategies, benchmarking |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Laboratory for Community and Economic Development |
| URL: |
http://www.communitydevelopment.uiuc.edu/cfarsriit.html |
| Title: |
Community Development Toolbox |
| Summary: |
The Community Development Toolbox offers an online environment where rural people pursuing community development goals are empowered to make better decisions as they solve problems facing their community. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community surveys, planning strategies, benchmarking |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Laboratory for Community and Economic Development |
| URL: |
http://www.communitydevelopment.uiuc.edu/cfarsriit.html |
| Title: |
Community Development Toolbox |
| Summary: |
The Community Development Toolbox offers an online environment where rural people pursuing community development goals are empowered to make better decisions as they solve problems facing their community. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community surveys, planning strategies, benchmarking |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Laboratory for Community and Economic Development |
| URL: |
http://www.communitydevelopment.uiuc.edu/cfarsriit.html |
| Title: |
Community Toolbox |
| Summary: |
Provides tools for comprehensive community initiatives and program evaluation, case studies, offers guidance including materials for presentation. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community assessment, strategic analysis, program evaluation; strategic planning, group facilitation, and problem analysis techniques, behavioral surveys, interviews, community-level indicator analysis, social marketing |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://ctb.lsi.ukans.edu/tools/tools.htm |
| Title: |
Community Toolbox |
| Summary: |
Provides tools for comprehensive community initiatives and program evaluation, case studies, offers guidance including materials for presentation. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community assessment, strategic analysis, program evaluation; strategic planning, group facilitation, and problem analysis techniques, behavioral surveys, interviews, community-level indicator analysis, social marketing |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://ctb.lsi.ukans.edu/tools/tools.htm |
| Title: |
Community Toolbox |
| Summary: |
|
| Methods and Tools: |
community benchmarking, strategic planning, surveying, resource assessment; development capacity index, development knowledge network, infrastructure readiness network, strategic planning activities, timelines, surveys, tourism development capacity index, resource assessment |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Laboratory for Community and Economic Development |
| URL: |
http://www.communitydevelopment.uiuc.edu/toolbox/ |
| Title: |
Community Toolbox (EZ/EC) |
| Summary: |
Contains references to materials and Web sites that can assist communities in accomplishing the goals concerning economic opportunity, sustainable community development, community-based partnerships, and strategic vision for change principles. Mostly informational links. |
| Methods and Tools: |
economic opportunity strategies, strategic visioning and planning, sustainable development practices, community organization |
| Applications: |
economic development, poverty assessment |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://www.ezec.gov/toolbox/ |
| Title: |
Community Tourism Assessment Handbook |
| Summary: |
This site walks the user through completing economic, environmental, and social assessments as they relate to tourism development, however, the methods can be applied to most economic development analyses. The site includes downloadable worksheets. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community organization, visitor and economic profiles, resident attitude surveys, visioning and goal setting, tourism marketing analysis, attraction and feasibility inventory, project identification, project scoping, impact analysis |
| Applications: |
economic development and regional analysis |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://extension.usu.edu/wrdc/ctah/section1.html |
| Title: |
Conducting Your Community's Economic Analysis |
| Summary: |
Your community is a composite of residence, service, government and business. All parts contribute to the well being of the community as a whole. Understanding the changes in individual components help community leaders guide communities. Understanding the condition of a community's economic base provides opportunities for community growth. The analysis of community economic base is not a singular task but a combination of assessments, potentials, efficiencies and strategies. The methodologies included in this web site are intended to provide business and community leaders an opportunity to better study and plan. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community economic analysis; trade area capture, pull factor, potential sales, location quotient, population-employment ratio, shift-share, employment multiplier, income multiplier |
| Applications: |
community and economic development, regional analysis |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| URL: |
http://www.southwest.msus.edu/rdic/rdic1999/economicanalysis.html |
| Title: |
Cooperatives: A Tool for Community Economic Development |
| Summary: |
A practical manual on how cooperatives can work as a form of community economic development. Provides examples and informational links. |
| Methods and Tools: |
cooperatives; feasibility studies, business plans, and surveys |
| Applications: |
economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
University of Wisconsin Center for Cooperatives |
| URL: |
http://www.wisc.edu/uwcc/manual/cover.html |
| Title: |
Green Communities |
| Summary: |
The Green Communities Assistance Kit that you will find here is packaged as a
step-by-step guide for planning and implementing sustainable actions.
Each of the five steps results in a specific outcome.
Tools include community inventory and mapping, social, demographic, and economic profiling. Provides case studies and resources. |
| Methods and Tools: |
Green Community designation, community assessment; community inventory and mapping, trend analysis, visioning, social, demographic, and economic profiling |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
US Environmental Protection Agency |
| URL: |
http://www.epa.gov/greenkit/ |
| Title: |
How to Conduct a Visual Analysis in Your Community |
| Summary: |
Step by step guide on how to conduct visual analysis, which is a way to gain new perspectives and solutions to a community's problems by using visual materials to convey them |
| Methods and Tools: |
visual analysis; physical, economic, demographic, and historic profiling, problem identification, participatory analysis, photographic survey |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Center for Rural Studies |
| URL: |
http://crs.uvm.edu/visual/howto/index.htm |
| Title: |
Inequality, Poverty, and Socio-economic Performance |
| Summary: |
Offers readings, concepts, case studies, and tools. This site aims to be a resource on: (a) the relationship between distributional dynamics, economic growth, and poverty reduction; (b) the effect inequality might have on social outcomes and behaviors; and (c) current discussions and methodologies that might be useful for operational and research work. |
| Methods and Tools: |
poverty and inequality analysis; poverty and inequality mapping, decomposition |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment and inequality measurement |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| Location: |
The World Bank Group |
| URL: |
http://www.worldbank.org/poverty/inequal/index.htm |
| Title: |
Information Sources: Geographic Information Systems |
| Summary: |
A guide with links to geographic information systems data and mapping tools, some interactive some not. |
| Methods and Tools: |
geographic information systems analysis, mapping, visualization |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, regional analysis |
| Friendliness: |
expert |
| Location: |
US Environmental Protection Agency |
| URL: |
http://www.epa.gov/epahome/gis.htm |
| Title: |
IUCN: Situation Analysis |
| Summary: |
A guide to conducting situation analysis, which is used to examine a wide range of key issues and emerging trends in a given geographical context for the purpose of making strategic decisions about programs and projects. |
| Methods and Tools: |
situation analysis; community profiling, workshops, problem trees, visioning, feasibility studies |
| Applications: |
community and economic development, poverty alleviation |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| URL: |
http://www.iucn.org/themes/eval/documents/sitanalysis.PDF |
| Title: |
LED Tools |
| Summary: |
Many of the processes that support local economic development (LED) strategy development and implementation may be supported by tools and techniques already developed by others. This site shares some of the tools that can be used in strategy development. |
| Methods and Tools: |
urban competitive assessment, strategic planning, stakeholder analysis, organizational analysis, business attitude survey, participatory evaluation; local economic development indicators |
| Applications: |
community and economic development, poverty assessment |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| Location: |
The World Bank, Urban Development |
| URL: |
http://www.worldbank.org/urban/led/tools.html |
| Title: |
Livelihoods Connect |
| Summary: |
This web site from the Department for International Development (DFID) presents their approach to creating sustainable livelihoods in order to eliminate poverty. It includes guidance sheets, distance learning materials, key documents and a sustainable livelihoods toolbox, all of which are available for download. |
| Methods and Tools: |
livelihoods analysis and participatory approaches, including environmental checklists, gender analysis, governance assessment, institutional appraisal, macro-economic analysis, market analysis, participatory poverty assessment, risk assessment, social analysis, stakeholder analysis, strategic conflict assessment, and strategic environmental assessment; surveys, timelines, seasonal calendars, transect walks, social maps, resource maps, preference ranking, matrix ranking, wealth ranking, venn diagrams |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Department of International Development |
| URL: |
http://www.livelihoods.org/ |
| Title: |
Measuring Change in Rural Communities |
| Summary: |
Measuring Change in Rural Communities is a hands-on guide for community residents interested in understanding how changes in the economy and demographic make-up of their community might shape the future. The exercises in the guide give communities concrete information that they can then use to create the future they want for themselves, their children, and the surrounding landscape. Includes downloadable workbook and Excel spreadsheets. |
| Methods and Tools: |
demographic, economic, and fiscal trend analysis; graphing and tabulation |
| Applications: |
community and economic development, regional analysis, poverty assessment |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| Location: |
Community Stewardship Exchange |
| URL: |
http://www.sonoran.org/workbook/download.html |
| Title: |
Methods to Strengthen Communities: Raising Capacity in Low-income Neighborhoods |
| Summary: |
This site provides a set of training modules for the community development worker in the field as well as policy, strategies, methodology, curriculum, management and planning materials useful to teams initiating or upgrading any community empowerment or development programs. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community empowerment, participatory appraisal, participatory management, community mobilization, capacity development, and more. |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Community Self-Management, Empowerment and Development |
| URL: |
http://www.scn.org/ip/cds/cmp/ |
| Title: |
Penn State and Cornell |
| Summary: |
This site offers a variety of tools and guides to community planning, economic development, and revitalization. Each tool within the toolbox follows a similar approach: first defining a problem or issue, describing methods for analyzing the problem, discussion on how the information can be used in community development programs, and providing a list of resources for more detailed materials and links to technical assistance providers. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community benchmarking, strategic planning, smart growth initiatives, participatory planning; concept mapping, GIS applications, community charting and visioning, business surveys, location quotients, shift-share, per capita sales analysis, pull factor analysis, market analysis, trend analysis |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| Location: |
Community and Economic Development Toolbox |
| URL: |
http://www.cardi.cornell.edu/cd_toolbox_2/cdindex.cfm |
| Title: |
Planning Analysis: Community Economic Analysis Tools |
| Summary: |
A number of basic analytical tools that can provide insight into the development of effective economic strategies. None of the tools can provide all the answers about what a community should do to achieve its economic goals. What these tools can do is to provide useful information on the characteristics of the local economy, which, in theory, should lead to better economic strategies. Therefore, some familiarity with the application of these tools is helpful. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community economic analysis; location quotients, employment multipliers, income multipliers, potential sales estimates, population/employment ratios, Reilly's Law, trade area capture, pull factors, shift-share analysis |
| Applications: |
economic development, regional analysis |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| URL: |
http://www.uoregon.edu/~rgp/PPPM613/CommEconAnalysis.htm |
| Title: |
Planning Analysis: Community Economic Analysis Tools |
| Summary: |
A number of basic analytical tools that can provide insight into the development of effective economic strategies. None of the tools can provide all the answers about what a community should do to achieve its economic goals. What these tools can do is to provide useful information on the characteristics of the local economy, which, in theory, should lead to better economic strategies. Therefore, some familiarity with the application of these tools is helpful. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community economic analysis; location quotients, employment multipliers, income multipliers, potential sales estimates, population/employment ratios, Reilly's Law, trade area capture, pull factors, shift-share analysis |
| Applications: |
economic development, regional analysis |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| URL: |
http://www.uoregon.edu/~rgp/PPPM613/CommEconAnalysis.htm |
| Title: |
The Asset-Based Community Development Institute |
| Summary: |
Workbooks and evaluative guides on mapping local capacities. |
| Methods and Tools: |
community capacity assessment; capacity inventory and mapping |
| Applications: |
community and economic development, poverty assessment |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://www.northwestern.edu/ipr/abcd.html |
| Title: |
The Citizen's Handbook |
| Summary: |
One of the most complete grassroots organizing guides available on the Internet. Based on work in Vancouver, but useful to people residing elsewhere. Not very in-depth, but provides some useful information for organizing and planning economic development initiatives. |
| Methods and Tools: |
information sharing, visioning exercises, intergenerational activities, community image making, project evaluation, group facilitation, citizen cooperatives; community blackboard, urban signaling, knock and drop, telephone trees, computer networking |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
beginner |
| URL: |
http://www.vcn.bc.ca/citizens-handbook/ |
| Title: |
The World Bank Participation Sourcebook |
| Summary: |
This is a guide to using participatory approaches, a process through which stakeholders influence and share control over development initiatives and the decisions and resources, which affect them. Explanations and examples are provided. |
| Methods and Tools: |
collaborative decision-making workshop based (appreciation-influence-control, objectives-oriented project planning, and TeamUp), collaborative decision-making community based (participatory rural appraisal and SARAR), stakeholder consultation (beneficiary assessment and systematic client consultation), and social analysis (social assessment and gender analysis); access to resources, analysis of tasks, focus groups, force field analysis, health-seeking behavior, logFRAME, mapping, needs assessment, participant observation, pocket charts, preference ranking, role playing, seasonal diagrams, secondary data review, semi-structured interviews, socio-cultural profiles, surveys, tree diagrams, town/village meetings, wealth ranking, and workshops. |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment, economic development |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| URL: |
http://www.worldbank.org/wbi/sourcebook/sbhome.htm |
| Title: |
The World Bank: Social Capital for Development |
| Summary: |
Social capital is defined as the norms and social relations embedded in the social structures of societies that enable people to coordinate action to achieve desired goals. This site provides several guides for conducting social capital surveys and analysis. |
| Methods and Tools: |
social capital assessment |
| Applications: |
poverty assessment |
| Friendliness: |
novice |
| URL: |
http://www.worldbank.org/poverty/scapital/ |
| Title: |
Tools for Community Design and Decision Making |
| Summary: |
This list is a collection of computer-based and non-technical visioning, design, and planning tools that can aid community groups in planning healthy, sustainable communities. The list is comprised of software tools such as Geographic Information System (GIS) programs, predictive models, impact analysis programs, and visualization programs. It also includes non-technical tools and resources, such as community visioning programs, interactive Internet community networks, information resources, and group consensus building tools. |
| Methods and Tools: |
visualization, decision making, impact analysis, modeling and simulations, land use planning, civic participation. |
| Applications: |
community and economic development |
| Friendliness: |
full-range |
| URL: |
http://www.ncat.org/comtool/tooldb.html |
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