What is Your Role in Creating Social Change?

Make Connections

The final part of the map embodies
the concept of an ecosystem. An ecosystem
is a community or network of different people
or systems that work together in order to achieve
common goals and shared values. In nature, we are
surrounded by ecosystems. Think about a pond in
your neighborhood where you can find ducks and
frogs coexisting with fish and turtles, all surrounded
by water, rocks and trees. Every part of the ecosystem
needs another part in order to survive and thrive. Trees
provide shade, rocks are places to rest, water
provides nourishment, and so on and so forth.

In the same way, social change networks
also need to rely and depend on each
other in order to advance their
goals. For example, a group
of volunteers in your neighborhood might be aiding seniors during the pandemic by delivering groceries or checking in on their physical health. At school, a club could be working on cleaning up local parks. Everyone within an ecosystem - a club, family, neighborhood, workplace - plays their individual roles effectively in order to achieve common goals.