COMMON GROUND CAMPUS
How does it Work?
How Does it Work?
The Common Ground Campus approach is designed to let people share their concerns on a particular issue and then have others not debate them, but to engage them through questioning and sharing perspectives in a process that hopefully leads to finding “common ground.”
This proven-effective technique used on high school and college campuses can be brought to your local community to help bring citizens together to find mutually agreeable solutions to complex and divisive issues.
Here's How!
Here's How!
1.
Identify the problem or causing disruption in your community or identify an event you would like us to host with you.
2.
Call a meeting of concerned citizens to address the topic. Tell them they need to bring two things: Their specific concern about the issue and their idea for a way to address the concern through a selected event The meeting can be community-wide, by precinct, by neighborhood, or any other grouping that makes sense.
3.
For the moderators/hosts, have community leaders from both sides of the issue on stage or participating in the event. The audience or participants engage by asking questions, sharing their thoughts on the concerns and ideas, or experience an interactive situation that bridges the divides. They don’t debate or argue with each other! They are there to listen, question, and contemplate out loud, and experience a new satiation.to help broaden their perspective.
4.
Let audience or members step up to share their ideas. Make them feel like a “star” speaking to the other attendees/participants, not just one of them when it is their turn to share.
5.
Whenever possible, most of our in person events end in a pizza party for everyone. “Breaking Bread” breaks barriers.
Tips For Success
Tips For Success
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Tell the audience/interviewee the only rule is hat no one gets to say “You’re wrong” to anyone else.
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Ask them to replace “I disagree” with “I see it differently.” That helps to keep people’s guard down.
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Have a “secretary.” Take notes! Don’t let the experience be terminal but make it continue by creating post-event action steps.
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Set audience/interviewee expectations so that they know they can’t expect their solutions to necessarily be implemented right away or even at all, but they can hope! Ideas never have a chance if they are kept as secrets!
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Ask them to take the ideas from the event/interview away with them but not the personalities. Nobody should be critical of other participants either in or out of the meeting.
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Have them sign up for email updates on the topic and periodically “touch them” digitally to share updates and ideas.
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Encourage them to hold the same kind of conversations with their families, friends, or social groups. The process works in any setting so long as the format is followed, and the spirit maintained.