What is Community Rising?

Community Rising is more than just a tool — it's a proven methodology that helps communities discover and amplify the wisdom, resilience, and beauty that already exists within them. Instead of focusing on problems or deficits, we systematically identify and connect the people, actions, and spaces that foster belonging, inclusion, and collective wellbeing.

The Cards

Character Cards Identify and celebrate the diverse roles and strengths that exist within every community. These cards can be customized to reflect the specific assets, leadership qualities, and community roles most relevant to your context and goals.

Action Cards Practice concrete behaviors and strategies that build community connection and resilience. Organized around core principles that can be adapted to your community's values and priorities, these cards provide actionable steps for positive change.

Location Cards Map and activate the spaces that foster community connection and wellbeing. Whether physical or virtual, formal or informal, these cards help identify and enhance the places where meaningful relationships and community building occur.

All card categories can be customized to align with your community's specific needs, cultural context, and strategic objectives.

Community Rising cards are designed to bring people together and help communities discover the incredible wisdom and strength that already exists among them. Whether you're mapping neighborhood assets, building workplace culture, supporting student development, or bringing healing to your community, our cards provide a simple but powerful way to start meaningful conversations and create lasting connections.

How It Works

Core Process

Choose Your Path Together Every community is unique, so we start by understanding what matters most to you. Whether you want to celebrate local heroes, plan for the future, heal from challenges, or simply get to know your neighbors better, we'll help you customize the cards to fit your community's specific needs and dreams.

Spark Conversations That Matter Use the cards to invite people to share their stories, wisdom, and experiences. You might conduct friendly interviews with neighbors, facilitate group discussions, or create opportunities for people to connect across differences. Each card becomes a bridge between people who might not otherwise meet.

Capture & Celebrate Your Stories Every card includes a QR code that connects to our digital community archives—think of it as your neighborhood's living memory book. Community members can easily share photos, stories, and reflections that bring each card's theme to life in your specific place. Together, you're creating a beautiful, ever-growing collection of what makes your community special.

Grow & Learn Together

Your journey doesn't end with story collection. We provide ongoing support and resources to help your community continue building connections and creating positive change.

Easy-to-use resources for community leaders and educators who want to facilitate meaningful experiences
A professionally produced film that showcases the power of community storytelling and connection
See your community's stories and assets come alive through augmented reality technology

Digital Tools

Learning

Student ambassador programs that empower young people to lead change in their communities
Workshops and ongoing support for educators and community leaders
Connect with others who are doing aligned work in their neighborhoods and organizations

Celebrate and share community stories through our documentary showcase
Annual gathering where young community leaders connect and learn from each other
Where educators and community builders come together to share resources and inspiration

Gatherings

Why Community Rising Works

Asset-Based Approach

Rather than focusing on problems, we systematically identify and amplify existing community strengths, creating positive momentum for sustainable change.

Intergenerational Bridge-Building

Create structured opportunities for meaningful interaction between different age groups, preserving wisdom while energizing innovation.

Cultural Responsiveness

Our flexible framework adapts to diverse community contexts while maintaining core principles of respect, resilience, and restoration.

Measurable Impact

Generate concrete results including relationship formation, story collection, skill development, leadership growth, and cultural shifts toward inclusion.

Evidence Base

Community Rising draws from proven research traditions and complements many asset-based frameworks that prioritize community strengths and relationships. Our methodology integrates insights from multiple disciplines to create a comprehensive approach to community building and social change.

Participatory Action Research: This collaborative research approach involves community members as co-researchers who identify issues, collect data, and develop solutions together rather than being subjects of external study. Community Rising embodies participatory principles by positioning community members as the experts on their own experiences and providing tools for them to document, analyze, and share their own stories and assets.

Relational Cultural Theory: This theory emphasizes that healing and growth happen through authentic, mutual relationships characterized by empathy, authenticity, and shared power. Our methodology creates conditions for relational healing by facilitating storytelling, celebrating diverse community wisdom, and building bridges between people across cultural and generational differences.

Targeted Universalism: This framework addresses systemic inequities by setting universal goals while developing targeted strategies that meet different groups where they are. Community Rising applies this approach by maintaining universal values of belonging and inclusion while customizing card categories and implementation strategies for specific community contexts and needs.

Trauma-Informed Community Approaches: These approaches recognize the widespread impact of trauma while emphasizing safety, choice, collaboration, and cultural responsiveness in community interventions. Community Rising creates trauma-informed spaces by prioritizing storytelling as healing, emphasizing community assets over deficits, and building resilience through connection.

Positive Youth Development: This framework builds on young people's inherent strengths, leadership capacity, and potential for positive contribution to their communities. Our youth leadership programs and student ambassador initiatives create meaningful roles for young people as community assets and change agents.

Restorative Justice Practices: These practices emphasize healing relationships and repairing harm rather than punishment, recognizing that sustainable change comes through restored connections. Community Rising incorporates restorative principles by focusing on community healing, relationship building, and collective responsibility for wellbeing.

Social Capital Theory: Research shows that relationships and networks create measurable collective benefits including improved health outcomes, economic development, and social cohesion. Our methodology strengthens social capital by creating structured opportunities for meaningful connection across lines of difference.

Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD): This approach focuses on identifying and mobilizing existing community strengths rather than cataloging deficits or needs. Community Rising amplifies this philosophy by providing concrete tools to discover, document, and connect the assets that already exist within communities.

Applications & Impact

For Communities

Asset Mapping: Identify existing strengths and resources
Gap Analysis: Discover opportunities for growth
Strategic Planning: Use community stories to inform priorities
Stakeholder Engagement: Give residents a voice in shaping their future
For Organizations

Team Building: Strengthen workplace culture through community connections
Diversity & Inclusion: Create authentic conversations about belonging
Youth Development: Empower young people to see their community potential
Anti-Bias Training: Use real examples to challenge stereotypes
For Educators

School-Wide Community Building: Help students see themselves as community assets
Social-Emotional Learning: Develop empathy and cultural competency
Human Rights & Civic Education: Connect historical patterns to contemporary dynamics
Anti-Bullying Programs: Create systemic cultural change
For Wellbeing Advocates

Mental Health Destigmatization Celebrate self and community care and build support networks
Wellness & Recovery Support Build support systems and create pathways toward healing and recovery through community connection