Chavis Heights Public Housing Community, Southeast Raleigh, Wake County, North Carolina : action-oriented community diagnosis : findings and next steps of action
During the 2002-2003 academic year, six students from the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education within the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Public Health, under the guidance of a preceptor from Wake County Human Services and faculty of the program, conducted an Action Oriented Community Diagnosis (AOCD) of the Chavis Heights public housing community in Southeast Raleigh, Wake County, North Carolina. The purpose of this document is to summarize the AOCD process, present findings, and suggest future action steps to improve life within the community. The paper begins with an introduction to the AOCD process, a basic history of the Chavis Heights public housing community, and some demographic information about Chavis Heights residents. This is followed by a description of the qualitative methodology used by the student team to conduct the community diagnosis. Findings from the data collection process are reported on six prominent domains identified during the AOCD process; those domains include crime, sense of community, services, youth, health, and schools/education. Under each domain, emergent themes are discussed, including a presentation of insiders’ and outsiders’ perspectives, secondary data analysis, and participant observations. Conclusions are then drawn about how well the four sources of information about the Chavis Heights community match up. A description of the community meeting, the culminating event of the diagnosis, and potential action steps discussed at this event are also discussed. This is followed by conclusions and recommendations made by the student team at the end of the diagnosis. While residents of Chavis Heights face many challenges, the AOCD shows that community members and service providers working in the area agree on which issues should receive priority attention. It is clear that the Chavis Heights residents have a number of strengths, including a strong devotion to the many children who live within the community. The coordination of outside resources and community input would certainly enhance the lives of many community members. It is the student team’s hope that with improved communication between service providers and community members, this document can serve as a useful resource for those working to make Chavis Heights a better place in the years to come.Master of Public Healt
