PARTNER GUIDELINE

Neighbours’ Hub (Hosted by the Windsor Essex Project Management Office)

As part of the Windsor-Essex Compassionate Community movement, Neighbours’ Hub is a community-run, collective impact service that partners Neighbourhood Coaches with neighbours, neighbourhood-based organizations, and youth so everyone lives better. We help set up neighbourhood social networks to make information and relationships more visible so it’s easier for people to watch out and care for one another. Neighbours’ Hub assists you to act as catalyst to create thriving neighbourhoods where skills and talents are orchestrated, and no one is truly alone when it matters.

Hub Roles and Responsibilities

The Neighbours’ Hub provides advice and support for the establishment of the following roles: Neighbourhood Coach; Partnership Coach.

1. Neighbourhood Coaches are assigned to support one or more neighbourhoods. They support existing Neighbourhood Champions to get people in the neighbourhood better connected socially. Coaches will survey neighbourhood members to ask what talents, skills, and interests they have that they would like to share or teach others in their community and what sorts of things they would like to learn or might need extra help with. Their information will then be entered on a tool that makes it easy for anyone in the network to reach out to each other to provide natural support.

2. Partnership Coach provides coordination, mobilization and communication support for host agency engagement, as well as a vibrant Teach Back, Teach Forward program based in neighbourhoods, connecting youth, schools, artists, seniors, and care recipients in intergenerational learning.

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Philosophy and Approach

Our focus is neighbourhood and community capacity development, not service. We will build capacity, resiliency and sufficiency by offering tools and resources that empower members to take charge of their own quality of life in the neighbourhoods they choose, and connecting them to the services and volunteers that either exist already in their neighbourhood or can be brought in to support them.

Ultimately, we wish to build stronger neighbourhoods and shared interest communities where all citizens live and die well, where no-one is isolated or neglected, and where people find it easy to help one another, support and look out for one another. We want to naturally break down the walls of social isolation within neighbourhoods so people can connect and trust each other. We want neighbours, social groups and students to mobilize themselves to offer extra practical help like household, social, transportation and home support to people who could do with a helping hand. There will be one number to call if you or someone near you is in distress, so we can reach out to people who need help the most.

Partnership Requirements

Strong engagement with host agencies (including United Way, Labour-sponsored Community Housing, Life After Fifty, Assisted Living Southwestern Ontario, and others) is considered core to the success of this approaches. We will partner with host agencies to support use of similar neighbourhood coaching protocols across the neighbourhoods they serve.

Creating strong partnerships with schools and youth volunteer placement services is considered foundational for recruitment of Neighbourhood coaches. We will approach both the Volunteer Internship Program (VIP) at the University of Windsor and the Community University Partnership (CUP) to explore partnership possibilities – including the use of similar neighbourhood coach protocols in designated CUP or VIP supported buildings in the city. We will enter strategic partnerships to connect youth, schools, artists, seniors, and care recipients in intergenerational learning. We are seeking to leverage the diverse range of natural talent that exists in the neighbourhood and the community. In this model, the neighbourhood provides the space, while the neighbours provide the talent, without a formal program in all cases needing to act in the middle.

Creating strong technology-based partnerships with the local tech community (Hackforge) and students who can teach seniors to use computers in targeted neighbourhoods is equally important. Ideally, we will find a local partner such as Hackforge to create a cyberseniors Open Badge program for local schools, and get local students within our targeted neighbourhoods to teach residents basic computers, Skype as well as our Compassionate Community Neighbourly social network tool.

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Creating strong creative partnerships with local artists and students who can organize outlets for creative expression in these same neighbourhoods is also important. Artists and students within the neighbourhood can help their neighbours rediscover their own personal music, housed in technology, as well as group events such as choirs, sing-alongs, jams, etc. Local artists could be encouraged to “adopt” the neighbourhood and organize sessions to create together. There is also the possibility for some of these created works of value to be sold at a big city-wide event - the proceeds of which will go back to the neighbourhood for further neighbourhood improvement.

Volunteer Coordination and Supervision

Through the demonstration and pilot phase of the Windsor-Essex Compassionate Community movement, all Neighbours’ Hub volunteer coaching assignments will be supervised and coordinated through the Compassionate Community Project Management Office (PMO). As part of the longer-term sustainability plan for this initiative, consideration will be given to the benefits of providing on-going neighbourhood coaching support for the community beyond the demonstration phase, and where such a function is best situated.

Space Requirements

The Hub is a virtual service, and does not require public facing program space. Volunteer coordination and project management space is shared with the Windsor-Essex Compassionate Community PMO.

Volunteer Recruitment

All Hub volunteers will be registered as student volunteers of Hospice Windsor-Essex. Initially, Neighbourhood Hub volunteers will be drawn from leadership programs such as Leadership Windsor-Essex, academic student placements from a range of college and university programs, academic action project assignments, and from word of mouth.

Volunteer Application and Screening

Volunteers will go through: Screening interview which explores previous volunteer experience, motivation for applying

for position, experience working with community agencies and older adults, and time availability

Face-to-face interviews with standard questions Reference checks (two or three non-family personal or work references)

All volunteers selected to participate in formal roles must sign a volunteer agreement/release and waiver that includes a confidentiality agreement. Volunteer Training

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Neighbourhood coaches will complete a modified Hospice orientation and training program, plus enhanced neighbourhood-based training. The Hospice Centre of Excellence will deliver the basic orientation program. The Compassionate Community PMO will deliver a practical introduction to Neighbourhood Coaching, and will work with volunteers to complete the PMO Neighbours Helping Neighbours Training module.

Neighbourhood coaches will also be trained as members of the Compassionate Community evaluation team. Volunteers will attend a one-hour training workshop to instruct them in qualitative research techniques and how to record and store evaluation-related information they will be collecting through this study. The workshop will also be available on-line if you are unable to attend the scheduled meeting time.

Volunteer Management and Support

The PMO Neighbourhood Lead (a.k.a. the Partnership Coach) will regularly check-in and oversee the work of the Neighbourhood coaches. Hub volunteers will meet regularly as a group for peer support, to share leading practices, to receive advanced education and to refresh or continue to develop coaching skills, and to reflect on what’s going well and what could be improved. Mentorship for the coach volunteer network will be organized through the PMO.

Sustainability

Eventually, we see Hub volunteers as regular community volunteer positions - anyone who wishes to be active in their neighbourhoods. This provides greater assurance of a sustainable structure and community longevity, and a clear pathway for how a neighbourhood would spontaneously get started to organize itself within the Compassionate Community framework we have developed.

Process (Implementation) Requirements

For more detailed processes, please refer to the Neighbours’ Hub Volunteer Manual.

Existing organizations working in targeted buildings and neighbourhoods and leaders of key social groups will act as catalysts for galvanizing and organizing natural volunteer networks. Student volunteers (Neighbourhood coaches) will survey residents and members as to skills and where they need extra help and populate a neighbourhood-based social network tool.

The Neighbours’ Hub in partnership with host agencies will work through the following processes:

Coordinate efforts with existing agencies. Reach out to any other agencies and services which are also providing outreach, capacity development or support services to the residents in your neighbourhood or group. Coordinate efforts to the extent possible so that residents or group members are approached once only about the initiative (and not asked over and over again).

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Identify champions. We believe that in any neighbourhood or network, a number of natural leaders and champions will be willing to step forward to help self-organize a natural network of care, once the opportunity is presented to them. Some specific ways this could be done are:- Use existing group meetings, gatherings or events, as the natural forum to discuss and gain

support for the idea of a supportive community where people look out for and help one another. Encourage members to share positive stories of 'how to ask for help, and how it can help you'.

- Use an existing residents association or residents meeting as a forum to discuss and gain support for the idea of a neighbourhood network.

- Start with the clients/people you serve, and invite those people to step forward as network leaders or to identify the best approach for involving the whole neighbourhood/building.

- Host an open house forum in the neighbourhood to gather and discuss how to self-organize.- Look for opportunities to host mini issue-based meetings e.g. a meeting on "supporting

those who with dementia in our building", "supporting caregivers", "practical helpers club".

Agree on an informal system within the network to match people who need extra help to those willing to volunteer. We are offering a tool-kit to help organize this for next to no cost. However, residents and members should be asked about their preferred mechanism for reaching out and being connected in a way that is sustainable and easy to organize. Since all efforts are volunteer-based, the selected mechanism should not be onerous or administratively cumbersome.

To help get an in-kind neighbourhood marketplace started, students will canvas residents and members about their strengths, skills, and things they would like to teach or share with others and use this information to populate a survey (as well as a database) that will match people who need help with those who are willing to offer help. Initially, we will use the web-based tool and community message board to help neighbours find one another and self-organize.

Other examples of strategies that could be used within neighbourhoods include: - Allow residents to identify their skills and willingness to help as well as need for help using a

newsletter, bulletin or database. - Your building/group may also want to consider setting up your own central support line. For

example, a particular resident may be able to take on this function or the building manager or residents association may be the appropriate host for the line.

- We can also help you explore use of appropriate people search and matching technology

Ensure an appropriate level of information, education and training is available to all neighbours. Neighbours are invited in and have a personal, social relationship with the individual and families they are connected to. Their function is as a “friend” and as such they do not require formal training, a police clearance or registration and supervision through a community agency. Completion of the “Neighbours Helping Neighbours” education module is encouraged but not required for participation.

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Where there are existing standards, expectations, and methods of supervision or documentation requirements for specific types of natural volunteers (e.g. volunteer hours for high school students), that group will work directly with their members to ensure their own processes are met.

The Neighbours training program will include education about understanding reasonable boundaries and the level of training and education required for specific tasks. Specific natural volunteers who wish to help out with tasks that are more personal in nature (direct care) e.g. help with bathing or personal care, helping to administer medication, or help with the use of medical devices - should be encouraged to approach the Hub to access more formal volunteer training to ensure their safety and the safety of the people they are caring for. Access to the new Caregiver College program through St Clair College might also be considered for more in-depth training for volunteers.

Where a vulnerable or under-served person is identified within the formal service system that lives within your building or shares the interests of your network, ensure a process is developed for providing enhanced natural support.

Encourage associations to play the role of a conduit back into the natural neighbourhood of care for people identified through formal health or social services who are without family, isolated or require extra social support and help within their neighbourhoods. Where such citizens reside with one of the early adopter buildings, catalyst agencies like you will ensure there is a clear protocol within the building to engage a robust network of neighbourhood support, which will work in partnership with formal programs and care providers within that resident’s circle of care to meet their personal goals.

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