Env Studies 600 Section 005: Community Based Research with the Natural Step Monona, Spring 2011

Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, UW-Madison, Grace Boblick and Brady Wolff

FIRST DRAFT: Analysis for Survey Questions 3, 4, and 6

CIVIC PARTICIPATION IN MONONA

After weeks of planning, organizing, and distributing this survey in collaboration with The Natural Step Monona, the City of Monona Sustainability Committee, and the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies the results are finally in. The survey questions that we investigated and analyzed in more detail included whether respondents were engaged in civic or business groups within Monona as well as the motivations and challenges associated with being engaged in community activities in general.

Of the 586 total respondents to our survey, 236 or 41% said that they did participate in civic or business groups within Monona and 337 respondents or 59% said that they did not. We believe this shows that there is indeed a large part of the population in Monona that is engaged in some type of community or business group.

The survey showed that what motivates Monona residents, or would motivate Monona residents, to be involved in civic or business groups was “having an interest in the group’s focus” with 70%, followed by “feeling good about serving the community” with 69%. The next closest response was “liking the people in the group” with 47% of respondents choosing that response. Although not a breakthrough finding, we believe this shows a general commitment to serving a larger cause like the community in Monona.

What motivates you, or would motivate you, to be involved in such groups?

Responses / Percentage
Getting educational benefits / 183 / 35%
Filling an obligation for family or friends / 88 / 17%
Having an interest in the group’s focus / 362 / 70%
Liking the people in the group / 244 / 47%
Getting direct benefits from being involved / 148 / 29%
Feeling good about serving the community / 357 / 69%
Other / 41 / 8%

However, the realization that most people are motivated by whether or not they have an interest in the group’s focus can help The Natural Step in trying to diversify their programing and offer more opportunities for those with different interests because we feel that almost any type of interest can incorporate more sustainable practices. Another conclusion we found interesting was that there was no difference between the motivations of those people who were involved and those who were not.

The biggest challenges that people have from getting involved in community groups was overwhelmingly “other obligations” with 64%, followed by 53% choosing “I don’t always know what groups or activities are going on.”

What are the challenges to being involved in Monona voluntary activities?

Responses / Percentage
Other obligations / 345 / 64%
Meetings take place when I am working / 75 / 14%
Meeting places are not accessible / 6 / 1%
The activities do not interest me / 72 / 13%
It is hard to join groups or activities with strangers / 67 / 13%
I cannot find child care during meetings or activities / 37 / 7%
I have no transportation / 11 / 2%
I don’t always know what groups or activities are going on / 285 / 53%
Other / 71 / 13%

It is impossible to know what exactly these other obligations are but raising a family and working are the most obvious possibilities. One interesting finding we discovered when looking at the biggest challenges facing the 59% who were not involved in civic or business groups was that they overwhelmingly didn’t always know what groups or activities were going on. We tried to find if these people were getting their news from a certain place but no correlation could be found. One thing we recognized was that the majority of write-ins for the “other” category had to do with age being their greatest challenge. This is important to know because a stronger effort could be made to assist those elderly folks that still wish to be involved. It also needs to be kept in mind however, that when looking at the demographics of who answered the survey there was a larger percentage of older ages compared to a younger population than there is in the Monona census.

These questions were asked because it is important to know what motivates people to be involved and the challenges they face. The Natural Step can use this information to better motivate people to become engaged in community activities as well as try to confront those biggest challenges.