How we began
the development school (tds) emerged from three inter-woven branches of thought and research about how we make sense of the world in which we live and work (our ‘environment’); how we best learn and how we create meaningful processes of social development in order to enable social renewal.
Making sense of the environment
“It is like we have learned the language and the symbols that show we have transformed but if you look beneath the surface, it feels like something important is missing.”. (NGO leader)
How we make sense of our environment conditions how we engage with it. tds views each situation as dynamic, unpredictable, relational and culturally unique. We encourage working with (rather than, say, trying to control) what is present in each situation and recognise that development needs to be systemic (a change in the whole) to bring social renewal.
Further we believe that an ability to critically assess dominant concepts and terms in the development field enables us to situate our own understanding and approach to social development.
Creating meaningful development processes
In the early nineties a study of the professional development needs of managers of UK social care organisations, faced with huge changes in their working environments arising from community care legislation, concluded that managers of nonprofit organisations had increasingly complex roles within dynamic environments which required skills that went beyond those taught in most management courses. The study’s author, Jenny Hyatt, termed these ’skills without edges’.
These ’skills without edges’ included imagination; strategic thinking and acting; political astuteness; power-aware networking; creativity and risk taking; participatory approaches; cultural awareness and adeptness; appropriate use of judgement; ability to work with an ethical practice and professional integrity.
Subsequently, in work with a wide range of civil society and public organisations in twenty countries, the study’s author realised that these ’skills without edges’ made the critical difference in enabling people to develop their services, organisations and communities for deep and far-reaching social benefit.
Learning well
tds’s approach to learning is based on three elements – exposure, reflection and practice.
Exposure to difference – different concepts, different practices and different cultures to those we are familiar with
Reflection – on our own understanding, our approach, our practices and our selves as practitioners
Practice – opportunities to look deeply at what we do and experiment with approaching our work differently
Enabling social transformation
Mainly, we work with individuals and groups who are based in civil society and public sector agencies who learn to make intelligent social interventions to bring about greater social and economic justice in a world marked by deep inequalities.
“The School has helped me to better understand the challenges of working with community groups, their internal dynamics and the complexity of local realities. It has helped us redesign our way of working with community based organizations and the support that we provide to community development practitioners. In turn, that has helped groups better engage with their situations to bring about concrete improvements in their communities and advocate for further needed changes.”
Florian Nitu, Executive Director, Romanian Association for Community Development and tds graduate
Tags: learning well, social development