1. Why should African Americans and Hispanics in the United States work together as minorities to address political, cultural, communication, and community issues? I feel African Americans and Hispanics in the United States should work together as minorities to address political, cultural, communication and community issues because African American and Hispanic Populations are now becoming the majority minority populations. In addition, the Hispanics are lagging behind and following in the foot steps of African Americans when they first came to the United States. Community organizing is described by the mobilizing of volunteers. Staff roles are limited to helping volunteers become effective, toguiding the learning of leaders through the process, and to helpingcreate the mechanism for the group to advocate on their own behalf (Beckwith and Lopez, 2006).Effective Community- a community that embraces one another and bridges and bonds people together. It can be defined as a population whose members closely resemble and identify with one another. This is becoming a common thread among these two groups who can collobratively lift one another up. Hispanics and African Americans in some ways resemble one another and rely on family and the social context of their environments to function and get through the daily tasks. The two groups can learn from each other to address the political, communication and health disparities that face these minority populations in about equal proportions.
2. What can be done to strengthen the relationship between the African American and Hispanic communities living within the United States.
Bonding capital brings people together closer who already know each other and bridging capital brings unfamiliar groups of people together. In essence, the more people connect with each other, the more they will trust each other and they are better off individually and collectively (Gittell, 2003). Four elements of Social Capital include: connections among practitioners who may or may not be co-located, relationships that build a sense of trust and mutual obligation, and a common language and context that can be shared by community members( Lesser et al. 2001). Effective communities can be developed from a social capital perspective, however , some implications arise which include: bridging of different communities together can actually cause conflict instead of good, community made need to time to adjust and understand one another, they will have to adopt certain leadership and communication styles to assist in helping the community function more efficiently and effectively.
3. How and why should Historically Black College & Universities continue to support the needs of African American Students and possibly the needs of the growing hispanic (and afro-hispanic) population in the United States? (According to Gittell, 2003), volunteers are identified from the targeted communities to develop technical and leadership skills. It is important to have members mirror or reflect the community itself in terms of race and ethnicity to reflect the diversity and represent the needs of the community. In essence, quality volunteers or Historically Black Colleges and Universities (individuals willing to invest their time and energy into a great cause) are highly desireable. Some of the musts (According to Gittell, 2003), include:1. Insuring participation is broad based versus centralized effort by a few knowledgeable and staffed with highly committed volunteer board members. Failure to maintain active board participation can undermine the organizations effectiveness;2. Volunteers should be provided with enough information so they can make sound policy decisions without overwhelming them with the challenges and task at hand;3. Prevent strong personalities or individuals with expertise from dominating the process but accomplish this task without the development mean coming off as controlling the boards themselves,4. Support projects or activities to fill the delays in the projects production process versus diverting volunteer attention from the primary initial task and slowing its progress. (According to Gittell, 2003), these four criteria are imperative and a challenge for all organizing efforts and for members to effectively manage a process that shifts meaningful expertise and control of groups without putting a damper on the volunteers engagement. Activities then take place to implement strategies. For example, every community organizing group has “founding or the original board members (Gittell, 2003). This group bonds and bridges the community with a different community of leaders to help accomplish the mission and agenda. They expand their network of contacts to identify other prospective candidates for boards. This in turn helps to establish the credibility of the group. The key to the organizing process of any group is to get off to a good start (Gittell, 2003). (According to Gittell, 2003), the following two components are important :1. A board must be formed of a proper size to manage the tasks to be completed. This requirement was mostly effected by the decision to collaborate with preexisting communities or not 2. To ensure that the group elected a strong cadre of officers of particularly an effective president. This is imperative to ensure the appropriate leadership and organization of the group to effectively delegate and assign tasks and keep the subordinates and followers interested in helping the leader carry out the goals and objectives of the organization.
