Using existing skills to strengthen communities and improve wellbeing
How Resilient Together used asset-based community development to empower residents to get involved in their community and improve wellbeing.
Resilient Together is a 3-year community building project developed and delivered by Cambridgeshire, Peterborough and South Lincolnshire Mind. It is focused on the communities of Wisbech and the Southern Fringe of Cambridge, with the aim of improving wellbeing and resilience in these areas.
Resilient Together has used the innovative asset-based community development approach. The approach brings people together using their existing knowledge, skills and lived experience to achieve positive change. It recognises that each person has a skill or asset they can contribute to lead to a greater sense of community. This helps residents to bring about change for themselves, around the issues they care about most.
The approach aims to build social connection, raise awareness about wellbeing and mental health, and empower people within their own community.
Resilient Together works in several different ways. Through resident-led activities, the project encourages residents to come together to make a change or take on a new community project. Through working with community groups, activities around mental health and wellbeing are developed to reduce stigma. The project also identifies residents’ skills and interests to connect them with others. An online map of resources within the community is being created to make them more accessible to residents.
The project has shown that by building on the human, social and physical capital that exists within local communities, an asset-based approach to community development can help individuals and communities maintain and improve their mental health, even when faced with adverse life circumstances.