Carr Court, Carrboro, Orange County : a community diagnosis including secondary data analysis and qualitative data collection
Creators: name: Harbour, Catherine
name: Haughton, Lorna
name: Schegloff, Naomi
Publisher: name: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Libraries
Year: 1998

description: Theory Community health educators include social and environmental concerns in their definition of health. Community diagnosis is a process for learning about a community from a variety of perspectives: from community members, from secondary data, and from service providers. Secondary data comes from census data, county, state, and municipal records, and from service providers. Other data used to learn more about a community includes qualitative data which comes from interviews with community members and service providers. The purpose of the community diagnosis is to understand a community's culture, its power structure, support networks, institutions, and history, so that a health educator can develop an "insider's view" while maintaining her perspective as an agent of change. This community diagnosis examines the Carr Court neighborhood in Carrboro, North Carolina, a community of 21 free-standing homes, ten apartments, and approximately 100 African American and Latino residents. Method The Carr Court Community Diagnosis ( CD) team members, Lorna Haughton, Catherine Harbour, and Naomi Schegloff, are first-year students in the master's program of the Department of Health Behavior and Health Education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's School of Public Health. The CD team began to research and analyze secondary data in September, 1997, and conducted qualitative interviews with Carr Court residents and service providers from November, 1997 through April, 1998. In February, 1998, the team conducted a photographic activity with youth in Carr Court, to gain their perspective on the neighborhood. Little secondary data was available for the Carr Court neighborhood. Census data for an area including Carr Court and several surrounding neighborhoods gave some demographic information, however, this data was collected in 1989 and did not accurately reflect Carr Court's current situation. Other more recent data was available only for larger geographic areas, such as Orange County, and may not have accurately represented Carr Court's unique racial and socio-economic makeup. Qualitative data from interviews with community residents and service providers filled in some of the gaps in the secondary data, and added an essential social and environmental perspective. Salient issues from these interviews included: sanitation and litter, the Ready Mixed Concrete Company, community cohesion, community investment, housing, outsider presence, crime and safety, race relations, the Carr Court Family Resource Center and Carr Court Head Start, spirituality, quality of life, and hopes for the future. In addition to primary data from interviews and secondary data from statistical information and reference material, the CD team worked with youths who live in the community, to include their perspectives of Carr Court, drawing on a technique called Photovoice. Photovoice tries to provide the means for people to record and consider their community's strengths and concerns, to facilitate discussion and understanding about important issues, and to reach policy makers. After a brief orientation to learn basic photography skills, youth went into the community in small teams accompanied by a CD team member. Using the camera, participants attempted to visually answer questions such as "What is interesting in your community?" "What are you proud of in your community?" and "What would you like to change in your community?" The CD team also encouraged youths to take some photographs "just for fun," to provide a more relaxed image of life in the neighborhood. The CD team interviewed youth participants individually and in groups about life in the community, using the photographs as prompts. In all, twelve children between 8 and 17 participated. Many of the photographs and some quotes from the interviews were displayed at a Community Forum, held March 7, 1998. Community Forum At the Community Forum, the CD team presented information from their secondary data research and from their interviews with community members and service providers. Community members who attended the Forum were asked to break into small groups to discuss issues important to the them. Recommendations To overcome the language barrier between Carr Court's African American residents, who speak English, and its Latino residents, who speak Spanish, the CD team suggests capitalizing on shared interests, such as the neighborhood's appearance, spirituality, and youth. The neighborhood holds two important organizational resources—the Carr Court Family Resource Center Board and the Carr Court Neighborhood Association. The Carr Court Family Resource Center has been active in developing and running programs for the community's families, particularly its youth. The Carr Court Neighborhood Association has been active for several years, and has recently organized to lobby the Town of Carrboro for funds for rehabilitation of owner-occupied homes. Some residents mentioned dissatisfaction with sanitation services, and many would like the appearance of the neighborhood to improve with decreased litter and more landscaping. Residents were also concerned with the quality of their housing and the safety of the physical environment. Environmental concerns surrounding the cement plant and drainage were also highlighted in interviews as important concerns. Some community members felt the neighborhood was less cohesive than it used to be, and wished residents were more connected to one another. Carr Court has hosted a variety of community, University, and service groups, and community members had differing opinions about the presence of these groups. Many community members felt proud of the decreased crime and drug activity in the neighborhood, as well as of the Family Resource Center. Residents also expressed mixed emotions about the Head Start center’s location in Carr Court. Finally, many people expressed a strong sense of spirituality, and an appreciation for a high quality of life in Carr Court.