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How does an organization that exists to promote social connection and combat isolation & loneliness continue its work in a climate of mandated social distance? It's a funny question, really. We have to appreciate the irony of our own existence in this interesting and difficult time, but staff and block leaders agree that this work is even more important now than it was previously, because of the need to isolate for the safety of our greater community. Our platform has always been that social isolation and loneliness are detrimental to our personal and societal health. We go back time and again to the Holt-Lunstad study that shows loneliness is as bad for our physical health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. Because of this, we have been working alongside our community in developing, testing, and implementing ways to decrease isolation & loneliness for years, and our work stands on the shoulders of Community Renewal International, who have been doing this for a quarter of a century. Although this crisis is difficult for many, it will ultimately serve a catalyst for the community restoration we’ve already been working on, and that healthy social connections will explode when shelter-in-place & social distancing guidelines are lifted. Since our inception in Fall 2015, we've been working to help neighbors restore community through intentional relationships, offering support in being visible to, interacting with, and gathering neighbors. Neighbors know that social media and electronic versions of social connection are helpful, but that they are not adequate alone to build the kind of relationships we need to be connected, caring individuals. Now that nearly all our connections have to be virtual, for many of us it has re-awakened a desire for face to face interactions. We are getting the opportunity to learn how much we need real, live, non-virtual connection for our social and emotional health. For nearly five years, trained volunteers now numbering in the thousands (156 Block Leaders and 4,230 We Care. team) supported by a dedicated staff have laid important groundwork for our community’s social connectedness -- resulting in heightened resiliency and collective efficacy -- the benefits of which are being reaped now, during this difficult time for our community. “Pfefferbombs’ research shows that communities bounce back better when there’s social capital. The great thing is, because we have been working on this as a community for years, we’re ahead of the curve,” said Block Leader Coordinator Zoe Loeser. “The network is already built, so now we as a staff are focused on supporting those neighbors, and providing resources and education to help them continue the important work of connecting and caring long-term.” Here are a few of the ways we’re responding to COVID-19 operationally: As our on-campus programming is significantly reduced, we are allocating some of our staff to partner organizations who are meeting more acute needs during this time (specifically, Community Market of Pott County and Shawnee Public Schools). We are using our platform as a trusted community voice to maintain and distribute a comprehensive Pottawatomie County-specific Resource List that is updated and distributed widely online on a daily basis. We’re working hard to connect constituents, organizations, and helpers so that the social capital exists to facilitate the movement of resources to the needs. We’re remaining flexible and creative in finding ways to provide comfort & hope to adults & children, such as sending out our We Care. Bear to work at Community Market. Additionally, we have altered the way our programs are delivered, so that all may remain operational. Youth Development Program Changes For the students in our typically campus-based youth development programs, a new daily video series inspired by Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood is airing on YouTube. Produced by club leaders, the series In the Neighborhood released its twentieth episode this week. In each episode, leaders give students a window into their homes, yards, and life to learn one simple aspect of social / emotional health each day. Neighboring Support Altered Block Leaders are meeting weekly (virtually, of course) to offer support, share resources, and encourage one another as neighborhoods have become more active than they’ve been in decades as people are staying home, and the front line of friendly care has moved to neighborhoods. We are also holding online trainings for the We Care. Team to inform & educate on the topics of loneliness and isolation, and how to combat it. The final episode of the series will air next Friday; find Community Renewal on Facebook for more info. “Our experience organizationally is not unlike that of other nonprofits and businesses -- we are having to put a lot of thought and effort into pivoting how our services are delivered to keep this movement going,” said Community Renewal’s Executive Director Brandon Dyer. “I am really excited at what our staff and volunteers have been able to roll out in such a short period of time to keep connection alive and well.” The day will come when we will be safely able to reconnect with people we care about, mask-free and without a 6-foot buffer. As we were before and will be after, we're here to help neighbors restore community through intentional relationships, and we’re going to keep doing just that.

Before COVID-19 shut down school sites, Community Renewal served nearly 600 at-risk students (identified by their educators) with opportunities tailored to their needs through weekly clubs focused on Social-Emotional Learning and Leadership Development, as well as reaching every elementary student through our Campus Culture program. The We Care. Campus youth development initiative has always been about meeting students where they are and ensuring they have the tools and the support they need to become the caring, connected neighbors we need for the future. With COVID-19 safety measures closing traditional schools for the rest of the semester, meeting students where they are has just taken on an additional layer of meaning for us. Partnership with Shawnee Public Schools, Pleasant Grove School, and McLoud Middle School have enabled us to serve their students at multiple levels of need, and we are walking alongside administrators and teachers now to continue the work we’ve been doing, in new ways. The best example of this is the new daily video series, In the Neighborhood, where club leaders bring their students into their homes, yards, and life to learn one simple aspect of social / emotional health each day. → In the Neighborhood series In addition to this video series, our We Care. Campus initiative staff are connecting with their students through technology and mail, as well as continuing to build relationships with families of our students in their homes and in our neighborhoods. “Staff has been working very hard to ensure we stay connected with our kids” said Club Leader Rachel Monday. “It is exciting to call a family and hear just how much the little act of writing a letter to them made their day. We will do everything we can to make sure they stay safe and healthy during this time while still feeling seen, loved, and valued.” Best of all, We Care. character curriculum is being distributed as a part of Shawnee Public Schools’ distance learning materials, and we were able to produce a version for the Early Childhood Center so the littlest of our kids are also learning to care well, even in this strange and difficult time. → We Care. Campus Daily Activities for littles; “E is for Encouragement”

Watch, read, and listen to the recommended resources below to learn more about isolation and its role in our society's systemic issues. Watch “This Land of Strangers” – Robert Hall, Values Aligned Leadership Summit “The lethality of loneliness” – John Cacioppo at TEDxDesMoines “Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis” – Robert Putnam, LA Times Festival of Books “The hidden influence of social networks” – Nicholas Christakis, TED2010 “Tracing Linkages between Social Isolation and Poverty” – Overcoming Isolation and Deepening Social Connectedness symposium, BBC “Our lonely society makes it hard to come home from war” – Sebastian Junger, TED Talks Live “From Isolation to Transformation” – Hazel Stuteley, at TEDxExter “What makes a good life? Lessons from the longest study on happiness” – Robert Waldinger, TEDxBeaconStreet “How cohousing can make us happier (and live longer)” – Grace Kim, TED2017 Listen “Businesses to Benefit from Addressing ‘Loneliness Epidemic,’ Doctor Says” -- All Things Considered, NPR “Political Scientist: Does Diversity Really Work?” – Analysis, NPR Read Articles “U.K. Appoints a Minister for Loneliness” – Ceylan Yeginsu, The New York Times “Relationship Between Loneliness, Psychiatric Disorders and Physical Health?” – Journal of Clinical and Diagnostic Research “Poverty, isolation, and opportunity” – Emily Cuddy and Richard V. Reeves, Brookings Institute “How are poverty, ethnicity and social networks related?” – Joseph Rowntree Foundation “The terrible loneliness of growing up in Robert Putnam’s America” – Emily Badger, Washington Post “School Connectedness: Strategies for Increasing Protective Factors Among Youth” – Center for Disease Control “Work and the Loneliness Epidemic” – Former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, Harvard Business Review “The Surprising Effects of Loneliness on Health” – Jane E. Brody, The New York Times “The Power of Human Touch” – David Brooks, The New York Times “Loneliness May Warp Our Genes, And Our Immune Systems” – Angus Chen, NPR Books This Land of Strangers, Robert Hall A Study of History (The Growth of Civilizations), Arnold J. Toynbee Braving the Wilderness, Brene Brown The Art of Neighboring, Dave Runyon and Jay Pathak The Transformations of Man, Lewis Mumford Our Kids: The American Dream in Crisis, Robert Putnam Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community, Robert Putnam Want to download this list and take it with you? Open the document in a downloadable PDF format below:

Building a life of caring doesn't have to involve volunteering your time, attending meetings, or adding more things to your ever growing to-do list. You build a life of caring out of the life you're already living, the routine you already know, and the things that already make you happy. Download the worksheet and learn how to leverage your life to care for the people in it.

You work for Community Renewal as the Friendship House Coordinator. Tell me a little about Community Renewal and then give us a good look at Friendship Houses! Community Renewal was started by a gentleman named Mack McCarter in Shreveport, Louisiana. It evolved from him seeing some of the things that society needed - the broken down relationships that were causing families, communities, and neighborhoods to come apart. He realized that politics and religion and government and all the things weren’t going to fix this. What was going to fix this was when we individually, one by one, begin loving and caring for each other again. Our mission is to help neighbors restore community through intentional relationship. That’s the fancy lingo for what Community Renewal does. It’s about restoring relationships, about being intentional, about loving on each other, about getting out of our fancy boxes we pull up to and shut the door, and saying there are bigger better things right outside this door. It’s not the cars, it’s not the homes, it’s not the neighborhoods. It’s the people. Those are the things we need to be investing in, and those are the things we need to be seeking out. That’s what makes our lives better. Through that, there is a three tier process of Community Renewal. The first one is what we call the “we care team.” There are more good guys and good gals in this world than bad guys and bad gals. We’re going to do our best to unite on the same team and say “we care, period.” Not “we care if,” not “we care when,” not “we care because,” but “we care, period.” The second tier is our block leaders. They go a little bit further. “I’m going to be part of the we care team, but I’m also going to seek out my neighbors and seek out the people on my block. I’m going to get us all together and find common ways that we can get together and hang out and do things.” We hope that through those interactions, we can share and lift and be part of life and help each other overcome the bad but also celebrate the good. Being able to share that with other people helps them to see, “Man, these are real people just like me. They live and do life just like me.” When we share in that, we become real to each other. The last part is the friendship house, and that’s what I have the awesome privilege of being a part of. A friendship house is where we have an intentionally picked out neighborhoods that, from the outside, looks broken. It’s easy to spot some neighborhoods where it feels like the trust is gone. They feel like there’s not as much openness and love in that neighborhood. The friendship house is a hub where we can bring other organizations to them. They can meet with themselves and enjoy and get back to trusting and loving and taking care of and being part of things. Our hope, through friendship houses, we can intentionally move a family in there that will live out of a house to bring those families back together, to bring joy and hope back into their lives - that they already have. They haven’t lost it. They just can’t see it right now. Friendship house in Shreveport has just astronomical results in the neighborhoods. The crime statistics are just one thing that’s absolutely amazing. They have 10 houses right now that are spread out over five different neighborhoods. The last data that the Shreveport Police Department released was over an average 51% decrease in violent crimes where these houses are. There’s one neighborhood in particular. Fire and EMS would not respond without a police escort to this neighborhood, because they would get mugged. They would get shot at or they would steal stuff off of their trucks while trying to help people in the neighborhood. In that neighborhood, this last year, they reported zero drug arrests. It’s amazing. It has nothing to do with the fact that there’s a friendship house on the top of the hill. It has everything to do with the group of people getting together and saying, “It’s time for us to start caring for and loving on each other. It’s time for us for us to build relationship and get to know each other.” One by one those relationships grew and grew and grew. It’s not just one family or two families in there. It’s those  two families loving on a family and that family going next door and loving on a family and that family going. It’s the domino effect that continues to change and reshape that neighborhood. Why are Community Renewal and Friendship Houses not gentrification? We want to make sure that every time we talk to anybody from a “disadvantaged neighborhood,” our plan is to bring, not necessarily who we are to them, but to go help them become the best them they can be. We don’t want to replace their life and value with our life and our values. At no point do we tell them that they have to live or act or walk or talk or do anything like we do. Those values and beliefs shape us as people, but they at no point should be forced on someone to assimilate. Our plan is to come and say, “We love you just like you are, just who you are, and we want you and your family have what you and your family feels like it needs to be successful.” We want to come in and say, “We want to help you. What do you see your life needing to be? What are some of the things you would like for your family to have and achieve?” It’s not because of the things we bring to them, but it’s giving them the tools that they want and they need to make a better life for themselves. We want them to be proud of who they are and to be able to give something back to their families. Those neighborhoods were there long before we came on the scene and will be there long after we leave this earth. Our hope is that we can help those neighborhoods grow to the glory that that neighborhood wants to be, not what we want it to be. What advice can you give to readers about engaging their neighborhoods? The thing I love about this is you do not have to be that superstar that everybody just loves and wants to be friends with. You don’t have to be that superstar, but you do have to be authentic. That’s the first thing. Be real, be authentic. If there’s a struggle there, then work on that struggle first before you try to enter into a relationship. Tear down some of those barriers some of those things that would keep you from really loving or caring for that person. The worst thing ever would be to enter into the relationship and go, “Hey, I want to be friends with you,” and then go, “Hey, that’s weird about you. I can’t be your friend anymore.” That’s no good. The next thing would be look for common ground. It’s not going to be politics. It’s not going to be religion. It’s not going to be sports teams. But everybody can say, “I want a safe, clean neighborhood. I want to wake up everyday and be excited about where I live and the people next door to me. I want to walk out on my porch and wave at my neighbor and have them wave back to me and feel like I like them and they like me.” Those are things common things that you can really start out on. Share things that you love. If there’s something you really enjoy, share it with somebody. Be intentional about looking around and noticing things that other people do and try to engage in that. We can’t just show up and say, “Hey, everything’s great! You’re going to be my friend.” You have to say, “Hey, here’s something that I really love and if you like it, great. If you don’t, great. What are something that you like to do? Oh, I’ve never tried that.” The best friendships that I have are people that don’t look like me, that don’t act like me, that don’t talk like me. I’ve realized that those people are going to be people that I want to be around. They make my life richer. They make my life fuller. They make me want to think outside of the everyday I get so caught up in. Look for those opportunities. Anything else? Just care, period. Leave all the if, and, and buts out. If you care, period, then people will know that it’s real.