Vision Building and the Rural Community College:
Ingredients for Successful Rural Community Development
Paper Presented
at the
Rural Community College Alliance Conference
October 9, 2002
Memphis, Tennessee
Stefani Gray Hicswa
The University of Texas, Austin
stefani@pobox.com
Vision Building and the Rural Community College:
Ingredients for Successful Rural Community Development
Introduction
Throughout the twentieth century, rural America has struggled to maintain a
standard of living commensurate with rest of the nation. The decline of agricultural and
natural resource work has left many rural communities dependent and poor (Duncan,
1999; Eller et al., 1998a, 1998b). As the national economy has shifted, jobs have become
scarce and unstable in most rural communities (Tickamyer and Duncan, 1990, p. 68).
These problems contribute to a cluster of social problems, including blocking the
emergence of a community field and restricting the development of a complete and
integral local society (Wilkinson 1991, pp. 81-86). Yet, Summers (1986, p. 352)
contends, “as long as human beings confront harsh physical and social environments,
there will be community as a form of collective action, because mobilization has its roots
in individuals’ private troubles.” Implementing cohesive community development is
difficult because fragmentation among community groups is common in many rural
distressed areas (Garza & Eller, 1998; Luloff & Swanson, 1995; Miller, 1995).
Communities with knowledgeable leadership and informed, active citizen
participation sustain the most successful and cohesive community development.
Unfortunately, rural community leaders are usually volunteers with limited experience in
involving citizen participants. Most lack sufficient skills necessary to activate citizens
and implement development activities that contribute to the community’s social well
being (Grymes, 1978; Kline, 1996, p. 166; Walzer, 1996, pp. 1-10 Wilkinson, 1991, p.
76).
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Developing recognition of commonalities faced by community members provides
solidarity of purpose, which leads to a motivational basis for creating a vision (Flora and
Flora 1993; Miller 1995). However, before community leaders embark on visioning
activities, they must be aware of potential difficulties and anticipate problems associated
with strategic visioning.
The purpose of this paper is to explore strategic visioning barriers and identify
common elements of success in rural communities. The paper begins with a description
of community colleges’ community development mission and short history of community
planning followed by barriers associated with community visioning and how these
problems impact rural community development. The paper concludes with an overview
of elements that contribute to successful community visioning.
Community Colleges’ Community Development Mission
Over the past twenty years, leaders of national organizations have explored the
capacity of community college leaders to serve as community development agents. In
1980, the president of the American Association of Community and Junior Colleges,
Edmund J. Gleazer, posed the question, “should not the community college play a part in
forecasting and in leading its community to understand the coming changes, make
provisions for coping with them, and providing services to meet them?” (p. 7). The
American Association of Community and Junior College’s Commission on the Future of
Community Colleges addressed this is question in 1988. The Commission’s report,
Building Communities: A Vision for a New Century, states, “building communities is …
an especially appropriate objective for the community college because it embraces the
institution’s comprehensive mission” (p. 7).
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In the early 1990’s, Edgar J. Boone and George B. Vaughan, in their work with
the Academy for Community College Leadership Advancement, Innovation, and
Modeling (ACCLAIM), went beyond assessing community colleges leaders’ capability to
enhance community development. Boone and Vaughan urged community college leaders
to collaborate with other community leaders, and play appropriate roles in applying
rational, orderly process to help resolve community issues (Boone & Vaughan, 1993, p.
2).
The Ford Foundation combined Boone and Vaughan’s goals of community
development and access to education when they developed the Rural Community College
Initiative (RCCI) in 1993. In a series of Project Briefs by the American Association of
Community Colleges, Eller, et al. (1998c) state, “The most successful RCCI community
development teams brought together diverse elements of the community and opened
dialogues.” The briefs further explain that the community development teams relied on
informal communication and interpersonal leadership skills to persuade community
members to assume responsibility for specific outcomes.
Research has shown that initiative strengthened rural community colleges by
enhancing their capacity to serve as community development agents (Eller, et al., 1998b;
MDC 1998, 2000a, 2000b) and the hub for continued innovation and change for rural
communities (RCCI National Assessment Report, p. 4). As a result, Sarah Rubin and
George Autry wrote a policy paper in 1998, as part of the Education Commission of the
States’ (ECS) Critical Roles for Community Colleges project. The authors call for rural
community colleges to be catalysts for economic renewal and build social capital to
provide a foundation for community development and planning.
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Recently several college administrators have successfully implemented strategic
visioning programs. For example, Alabama Southern Community College leaders held a
community summit in 1994 and a follow-up meeting in March 2000 to determine
community priorities. Northern New Mexico Community College administrators held a
series of community meetings in 1997, which led to the creation of a community
development corporation. In 2000, employees at New Mexico State University - Carlsbad
set up a community development day where nearly twenty-three hundred residents voted
for the most desired community development projects. (MDC, Inc. & Video Dialog, Inc.,
2000)
In some rural areas, community college administrators have collaborated with
community leaders to incorporate vision and consensus building to unite the community
into action. For example, the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory’s community
development partnership program built local capacity for renewal and growth by using
school leaders to play a vital role in community planning (Miller, 1995). However,
community-planning roles have changed as approaches to planning changed.
History of Community Planning
In 1908, Theodore Roosevelt proposed programs to improve country life by
bringing rural America up to twentieth-century urban standards of social and economic
efficiency. Community development became a major component of the proposed rural
progress program, and resulted in a decade of rural industrialization and associated
service sector growth in rural America. (Fugitt, 1985; Summers & Branch, 1984;
Summers, 1986)
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Although formal community planning was not widely practiced before World
War II, post-war needs precipitated federal funding for highway construction and
antipoverty programs. Program planning efforts were usually carried out by hierarchical
managers or technical experts in government. Governmental officials and the few
involved in local programs held community leadership positions. (Ayers, 1996, p. 22-23)
The community planning approach shifted in the 1970s to focus on
comprehensive long-range plans. Since many federal programs available during this time
required a comprehensive community plan to qualify for funding, professional planners
were often hired to develop them. Subsequently, local officials adopted legal mechanisms
such as zoning and subdivision ordnances to enforce the objectives. Comprehensive
planning was a technical process where citizens were merely informed of the effort, and
citizen ownership was limited. (Ayers, 1996, p. 22-23)
Although formalized strategic planning became popular in the private sector in
the 1960s (Robbins, 2000, p. 140), strategic planning did not emerge in the public sector
until federal funding began to decline during the 1980’s (Bryson, 1990, p.5). During this
time, government intervention in community planning was perceived as intrusive
(Brager, Specht, Torczyner, 1987). This, combined with a shortage of resources and stiff
economic competition, necessitated a strategic approach to community development
(Ayers, 1996, p. 23).
Strategic planning offers a structured way for a community to analyze itself both
internally and externally, and creates objectives to address community needs (Ayers,
1996, p. 23). The objectives coordinate efforts and give direction to community leaders to
produce actions that shape the community (Bryson, 1990, p.5). The resulting action plan
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seeks to position a community in terms of its environment, over an extended period of
five or more years (Robbins, 2000, p. 138).
Strategic visioning became the planning approach of the 1990s. Unlike strategic
planning, strategic visioning first creates a future that is desirable, then works toward
reaching the desired end state (Ayers, 1996, p. 23). Strategic visioning became widely
known with the publication of Peter Senge’s, The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice
of the Learning Organization (1990). Senge states, “A [strategic] vision is a vision that
many people are … committed to because it reflects their own personal vision.”
Similarly, Ayers (1996) describes creating a vision as painting a picture of what the ideal
community will look like in the future.
Strategic visioning programs have proliferated in recent years (Gruidl, 1996).
Although the most obvious outcome of strategic visioning programs is involving
community members in creating an action plan through consensus building, most people
find it difficult to move beyond the current, most pressing issues (Gruidl, 1996, p. 133).
Creating a strategic vision in a rural community is hard work since most issues are
complex, interrelated, and require immediate attention (Ayers, 1996; Woods, 1996, p.
80). Order and unity are always in question, and problems continually arise (Wilkinson,
1991, p. 90).
Barriers to Visioning
Many have dreamed up republics and principalities which have never in
truth been known to exist: the gulf between how one should live and how
one does live is so wide that a man who neglects what is actually done for
what should be done paves the way to self-destruction rather than self
preservation.
(Machiavelli, trans. 1952)
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Similar to Machiavelli’s observations, de Tocqueville noted more than a century
ago that people in the United States had a unique flair for organizing themselves into
groups to deal with problems (de Tocqueville, trans. 1969). Judging by the proliferation
of organizations, agencies, and groups dealing with every known problem, the organizing
fervors noted by Machiavelli and de Tocqueville continue to thrive today. Yet, the results
are not commensurate with the gravity of the problems or the effort expended (Fessler,
1976, p.1).
Consequently, strategic visioning has come under increased criticism in recent
years. Although visioning has an intuitive appeal in rural areas, there are several
arguments against strategic visioning programs, including issues of defining the
community, rural mobilization, and the culture of local structures and systems. The
following overview describes these barriers to successful strategic visioning in rural
communities.
Issues
To understand the barriers associated with strategic visioning it is important to
understand the issues confronting rural community leaders seeking to formulate a vision.
According to Summers (1986, p. 354), tension exists between those who view the
community as the causal factor in the well being of residents, and those who view
community as the stratification system, power structure or human ecology in a locale.
Warren (1970, pp. 536-541) notes that the ambiguity regarding the definition of
community is linked to problems associated with identifying relationships within a
community. Determining which people within the community should interact and how
well they should be expected to know each other must be addressed before beginning a
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visioning process. Unless community leaders have a clear conception of how they view
community, they cannot set realistic community development goals or measure progress
toward objectives (Warren, 1970). In defining community, residents also need to
determine their desired level of local autonomy, as federal and state grant programs often
place considerable limitations on local freedom.
If communities are serious about strategic visioning, they must also confront the
issue of power in the community. The power elite is usually involved in community
planning, as they contribute resources and manipulate the process to benefit the “haves.”
A community visioning process is likely to cause power imbalances. However, in order
to insure successful strategic visioning leaders must involve the community’s powerless
(i.e. the poor and minorities) in the process, as the “have-nots,” are those most affected
by the plan (Warren, 1970, pp. 536-541). According to Alinsky in Rules for Radicals
(1971), involving and mobilizing the “have-a-little-want-more’s” is the most effective
method of confronting community power.
In addition to confronting power issues, community leaders, must determine how
widespread participation should be and decide the limits of involvement and commitment
at each level (Warren, 1970, pp. 536-541). The plan is meaningless to those who do not
participate, yet it is impossible to involve everyone in a visioning process. Although
many community leaders seek to achieve participation and commitment that comes with
shared visioning, many community members think that planning is the top leader’s job.
On the other hand, many leaders prefer to impose a community plan rather than involve
citizens in the process. (Senge, Roberts, Ross, Smith, and Kleiner, 1994, p. 298)
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The value of citizen participation has risen to prominence in community life in
recent years. Citizen participation is best captured by the slogan, “one man – one vote.”
Programmatically this is seen to achieve participatory democracy. However, because
people differ so considerably in respect to interests, needs, resources, motivations, and
abilities, participation is often fragmented and partial. (Brager, et al., 1987, p.4; Warren
1970, pp. 540)
Before embarking on a strategic visioning process the extent of conflict within the
community must be analyzed. Community leaders should determine the extent to which
they will tolerate or encourage conflict in the process, as visioning models are often
based on consensus. Visioning processes that allow for and encourage appropriate
conflict are more likely to be successful because consensus models often permit the
continuation of the status quo and/or the continuation of gross injustices (Warren 1970,
pp. 536-541). Because reaching consensus is difficult, public scrutiny and rumors may
begin to infiltrate the process and hinder the visioning program (Kline, 1996, p. 161).
Rural strategic visioning has been marked by a continuing search for and struggle
over the means by which to reconcile these important and competing issues (Brager et al.,
1987, p. 4). While all of these issues must be considered in strategic visioning, it is
important to realize some concerns are incompatible and irreconcilable.
Rural Mobilization
In addition to the difficulties associated with defining and confronting community
issues, rural communities struggle with mobilizing the community to participate in
planning and implementing strategic visioning programs. If community organizations are
apathetic, disorganized or torn by dissention, the base of support for vision
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implementation is narrow (Ross & Lappin, 1967). Reed, Reed and Luke (1987) observed
that planning efforts fail if communities lack the capacity to participate.
According to Flora, Flora, and Wade (1996, p. 58), community capacity is the
characteristics of the community and the conditions in a community that increase the
ability of rural residents to mobilize resources and address specific needs. Luloff and
Swanson (1995, p. 353) define community agency as the community’s ability to mobilize
resources and address specific needs. Mobilization of resources to enhance community
well-being is less likely when community agency and community capacity is low.
A central factor limiting community agency and capacity is disaffection.
Community disaffection occurs with the deepening of the degree of fragmentation,
anomie, and alienation exhibited by members of local society (Luloff and Swanson,
1995, p. 359). Communities with high levels of disaffection exhibit problems associated
with disenfranchisement, unemployment, and poverty. Therefore, the presence of
disaffection prevents community members from participating in visioning processes
because low levels of interaction characterize disaffected communities. Such challenges
also contribute to stifling the local population’s creative expression (Luloff and Swanson,
1995, pp. 353-359; Wilkinson, 1991, p. 107). As Wilkinson (1991, p. 105) explains, this
is problematic because community development can only occur when there is community
action.
Structures and Systems
Although community action is necessary for development, mobilization alone
does not guarantee success for community visioning programs. Rural community
structures and systems form additional barriers to strategic visioning. It is difficult to
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solve new problems in community systems designed to solve old problems when
solutions become institutionalized and potency declines. Eventually old solutions
become problems, because communities have not learned how and when to terminate
obsolete organizations and activities (Bryson 1988 pp. 199- 215). This problem presents
difficulties to strategic visioning when leaders try to plan around existing systems.
Most strategic visioning programs do not evaluate organizations and activities to
determine if the old systems have stopped working and few programs have an ongoing
monitoring system to collect outcomes information to measure the success of
innovations. (Green & Deller, 1996, p. 113; Gruidl, 1996, p. 128). Although there is a
growing need for communities to assess the outcomes of their community strategic
visioning programs, little agreement exists over what is considered success (Bryson,
1990; Drucker, 1999). Frequently participants in strategic visioning view the program as
successful if something tangible is done to improve community well being (Green &
Deller, 1996 p. 112). Yet, stakeholders differ in their conception of tangible
improvement. Therefore, before evaluation activities can proceed and old structures are
modified, community leaders must communicate a common definition of vision
objectives (Gruidl, 1996, p. 128).
Too often communication is neglected when structures and systems become
substitutes for leadership. Typically, many persons, organizations, and groups have
partial responsibility for the visioning process but in most communities no one person,
group or organization is in charge of the strategic visioning effort. This results in
visioning systems that drive strategic thinking and cause the very problems they seek to
avert. Community leaders are responsible for working with community members to
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define the community’s mission and transform its structure and systems. The most
difficult problems in strategic visioning involve the transformation of institutional
culture. However, visioning programs that do not focus on understanding and working
with the culture of local systems are not effective. (Sarason, 1990, p. 61)
Visioning programs are also ineffective when the attention of key people is not
maintained throughout the process. Most people lose concentration as they gain
competency and begin to repeat tasks. By the time the objectives and activities are
defined, motivation begins to wane and the plan dies at the implementation stage.
(Bryson, 1988 pp. 199- 215)
A vision will also die at the implementation stage if sufficient resources are not
allocated to meet the plan’s objectives. Most strategic visioning efforts are unsuccessful
due to failure to budget appropriately. Community leaders must understand the
importance of financial commitment and allocate resources accordingly. Likewise,
participants must understand the importance of time commitment and the effort required
for effective strategic visioning. (Walzer, 1996 p. 184)
Unfortunately, despite the amount time and effort committed to the project, a
strategic vision will not address all community problems, nor can structures and systems
replace hard work, innovation, and intuition (Fullan, 1991 pp. 102-105). Leaders must
communicate that the plan is not permanent and can be revised. A window of opportunity
should not be ignored because it is not in the plan. Likewise, projects that become
obsolete should not be undertaken just because they fit the plan (Kline, 1996, p. 162).
These challenges combined with conceptualization and mobilization issues, make
specific formats for strategic visioning programs impossible.
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Elements of Success
While specific formats of strategic visioning programs differ, many common
elements contribute to successful community visioning. Developing recognition of these
commonalities provides solidarity of purpose and leads to a motivational basis for united
strategic visioning efforts (Flora and Flora 1993; Miller 1995). These elements of success
include: factors necessary to provide a solid foundation for visioning, characteristics of
community capacity, and components required to implement and maintain successful
rural community visioning. Foundation, capacity, and implementation elements are
described on the following pages.
Foundation
Several key elements provide an essential foundation for local visioning efforts
and greatly enhance the likelihood for success (Woods, 1996, p. 77). These essential
preconditions of success include willingness to adapt to change, accept controversy,
mobilize resources, and accurately assess the community (Flora and Flora, 1993).
Change in rural communities is inevitable. Global economic trends, population
demographics, social and cultural changes, as well as land use changes, consistently alter
communities (Penn State Cooperative Extension, 2001a, p. 1). Strategic visioning reduces
uncertainty in a changing environment by forcing community leaders to look ahead,
anticipate change, consider the impact of change, and develop appropriate responses to
change (Robbins, 2000, p. 140). According to the Penn State Cooperative Extension –
Community Affairs Extension (2001b, p. 1),
Most communities have little ability to control the changes affecting them.
What they can control is how they anticipate and respond to those
changes. Most successful communities view change as an opportunity
instead of a threat; they anticipate the changes that might occur in their
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community, they build a shared community vision about how to respond
and then work together to build that future. Having a common vision for
the future, shared by all within the community provides the ability to keep
ahead of change.
Wall and Luther (as cited in Woods, 1996, p. 78) note that coping with change in
small towns includes a vision for the future, a development plan, bias for action, positive
attitude, and entrepreneurial spirit. According to Drucker (1985) entrepreneurs not only
cope with change, they seek change, respond, and exploit it as an opportunity.
Entrepreneurial communities not only accept change, they also are willing to
accept controversy as part of the process of addressing community issues. Change and
improvement cannot take place if controversial issues are avoided. Successful
communities intentionally make information available to residents and hold public
forums to debate key concerns. Successful forums depersonalize politics and focus on the
issues (Woods, 1996, p. 76).
Resource mobilization is often noted as an area of critical concern for strategic
visioning programs. Successful communities have citizens or businesses willing to invest
time and money in the strategic visioning program (Woods, 1996, p. 76). Often readiness
to participate in a strategic visioning program is indicated by the community’s
willingness pay for assistance with the visioning process (Woods, 1996, p. 84). It is
imperative to secure sufficient financial support and allocate necessary resources to meet
the plan’s objectives (Robbins, 2000, p. 150-151). These financial obligations must be
well planned, compatible with the community vision’s goals, and based on solid data
(Grymes, 1978).
Another foundational element of visioning programs is an assessment of the
community and an accurate understanding of current conditions, including population,
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economy, local governance, and history (Penn State Cooperative Extension, 2001a, p. 1).
Successful communities emphasize research, recognize the global economy, and establish
linkages outside local boundaries. Information from diverse networks and reliable data
guarantees the comprehensiveness of the visioning program (Woods, 1996, p. 77, 79, 90).
Community assessment, resource mobilization, acceptance of controversy, and
adaptation to change provide an essential foundation for local visioning efforts (Wood,
1996, p. 77). These preconditions for successes must be combined with a strong
community capacity.
Capacity
Community capacity is one of the most important preconditions for successes in
strategic visioning programs (Rubin, cited in Schumaker, 1996 p. 94). Capacity not only
includes community organization, finance, and infrastructure but also determines a local
institution’s ability to contribute members to the planning team, recruit other participants
to implement plans, and maintain momentum throughout the process. Assessing
community capacity is an important first step for strategic visioning as there is little
question that strategic visioning is easier if a strong community capacity exists prior to
the start of a visioning process (Schumaker, 1996).
Community capacity also includes a “sparkplug” or champion to ensure ideas are
implemented and evaluated (Walzer, 1996, p. 15). In some cases, this leadership is an
elected official, a nongovernmental group member or retired community resident. Active,
trained, local leadership and individual organizers who have confidence and support the
community are important factors influencing successful visioning programs (Ayers,
1996, p. 35; Green and Deller, 1996, p.119; Walzer, 1996, p. 183).
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Once community leaders are selected and trained, a series of orientation meetings
is essential. Local leaders must identify the projects that best fit a community’s assets,
existing resources, and long-term vision. To guarantee subsequent stakeholder buy-in,
this vision must be shared with influential groups and investors who will help implement
the plan. After communicating the process and the effort required of leaders, the next task
is to select a coordinating team comprised of key players from each sector of the
community. Each coordinating team member must have the ability and willingness to
carry out, implement, and evaluate the plan (Robbins, 2000, p. 163; Walzer, 1996, p. 184;
Wood, 1996, p. 79, 86). The coordinating team should integrate local cultures and
involve leaders at all levels, including people in small-scale leadership roles who have
not previously thought of themselves as community leaders, and key stakeholders with a
vested interest in the community (Ayers, 1996, p. 35; Baldwin, 2001; Boone & Vaughan,
1993).
Involvement in decision-making processes contributes to well-being and
empowerment and maintains open channels of communication and cooperation among
local groups (Roueche, Baker, Rose, 1989; Senge, et al., 1994; Wilkinson, 1979). These
community capacity characteristics are frequently cited elements of social capital
contributing to productive strategic visions (Gruidl, 1996 p. 132; Woods, 1996, p. 85,
90).
Implementation
Although community capacity is imperative to successful visioning programs, the
vision must be supported by implementation and maintenance plans (Penn State
Cooperative Extension, 2001a). A team of participants willing to commit the time and
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energy to identify implementation methods and monitor progress is essential. Robbins
(2000, p. 163) explains, successful vision implementation encompasses: the choice of
correct strategies for the culture of the community; strategies congruent with the
community’s competencies and skills; supportive structures and systems; and participants
with the ability and skills to carry out the vision. Support following completion of the
initial development is crucial to continued local involvement and the ultimate
accomplishment of proposed community goals (Walzer, 1996, p. 15).
Conclusion
An overview of the essential elements and barriers associated with strategic
visioning in rural areas does not suggest that communities should abandon planning.
According to Wilkinson (1991, p. 106), purposive collective action is needed to increase
rural economic resources, improve rural services, reduce inequality, and facilitate local
leadership regarding community changes. Unplanned rural development holds little
promise of supporting sustained growth or improving the social and environmental
dimensions of community well being (Flora and Flora, 1993; Miller, 1995; Wilkinson,
1991, p. 101).
Communities in rural areas have an opportunity for significant revitalization as
businesses and residents see potential for a better quality of life or business climate. To
take full advantage of economic development opportunities, communities must
aggressively promote their advantages and create a clear plan that builds on these
attractions. Strategic visioning programs can provide the impetus and momentum
communities need to implement community development activities. (Kline, 1996,
Walzer, 1996, p. 17)
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Although strategic visioning is a beneficial element in successful community
development (Blair and Reed, cited in Gruidl, 1996, p. 128), not all communities are
candidates for a visioning process (Higdon, F.X., personal communication, April 10,
2002). Some communities may be willing, but not ready to address specific areas of
concern or weakness (Woods, 1996, p. 90). Community leaders must critically examine
community issues, structures, and mobilization factors to determine if a community is
able to undertake a strategic visioning process, both philosophically and practically. By
understanding these dynamics, community leaders can initiate meaningful dialogue
among community members, which leads to creation of a shared vision and
implementation of successful community development efforts (Boone & Vaughan, 1993).
Before community leaders mobilize into action and embark on creating a strategic
vision for community development, they must be aware of the potential barriers and
essential elements of successful community visioning. Visioning programs can go a long
way in helping communities take charge of their future (Walzer, 1996, p. 195).
“Although the task appears enormous, it is a worthy challenge for those concerned with
rural community development” (Summers, 1986).
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