Charette Process
This charette was a three day group project, day one consisted of talking to experts, recording and mapping our thoughts and brainstorming to find our scope and problem. Day two was brainstorming for solutions and then building those solutions. The final day consisted of prototyping our solution and evaluating the process and presenting our final project and findings.
Charette Prompt
How can we help libraries connect with hard to count populations in Philadelphia?
Brainstorming
• Individually mapped out Post-It questions and then grouped them based on theme and topic
• Presented our thoughts through the post it map
• As a group we pulled the similarities to create a singular cohesive map, that weeded out outlying thoughts and built upon our similar tracts
• Processed that map to identifying the largest barriers and how the issues could become the solution.
Results
Our results focused on the issues of trust and poverty.
Lack of trust of the Census within impoverished neighborhoods may be the largest barrier for completion
Problem
How do we get residents of low-income neighborhoods to trust that the Census is for them?
Question
What can we create that will provide a universal tool that assists trusted community members to spread information about the census?
Audience
We chose the South Philadelphia Library location. We wanted a variety of interactions with a wide group of people. Knowing that Point Breeze is relatively low income and has a diverse community, but historically has a mistrust of government
Solution
We went about creating a universal tool for mass communication that assists already trusted community members in spreading information about the census.
We needed to create an activity for our testing that began to build trust so we could utilize the tool.
Universal Tool- Zine/Poster
Goal: A universal tool that can be used by trusted community members to discuss and clarify the Census.
• Mass Communication
• Tool for trusted community members
• Debunk misinformation
• Could be easily modified to include specific information for a community or be translated into any language.
• When unfolded, the zine acted as a poster that could be hung in windows of shops and residences. In this way, the message could continue to be spread.
Action Tool- Chalk Talk Board
Goal: Create a sense of empowerment through engagement.
• Trust building tool-Because we weren’t trusted members of the community, we wanted to create a space for interaction.
• Create a call for civic action.
• Be able to answer questions about the Census.
Testing
We set up our chalkboard outside of the South Philadelphia Library with the prompt “In my neighborhood, I want…” and let people write issues or needs that they wanted addressed in their community.
This also provided the opportunity to pass out our printed zine that we had created and address immediate questions they had.
Findings
• A lot of engagement with the board with a diverse crowd
• Active conversations with residents about their concerns and questions
• Need handouts in multiple languages
• Need at least one translator, per language on site
• The chalkboard worked better with the zine handout—Zine provided a conversation starter.
• Children were very excited to interact with the board and also had problems and concerns they wanted us to know about
• The Zine was able to answer many of the questions that people had—what will be on it? How to fill it out? Where to go to get help?