NOAH has collected community-level and organizational data in East Boston, initiated the early development of a Climate Resilience Conceptual Framework, and developed the foundation for the creation of the ‘Whole Community’ East Boston Resilience Network (EBRN).
One of the key components of this has been the SCALE UP East Boston initiative: Social Cohesion, Adaptation, and Leadership in Emergencies in Urban Populations. The major goal of SCALE UP has been to enhance resilience for climate and other emergencies by building social cohesion and fostering systems-thinking among a diverse group of racial, cultural, and linguistic residents and community leaders in East Boston. To better understand whether improved social cohesion can help make vulnerable communities more resilient to climate risk, the SCALE-UP initiative designed four activities to assess and cultivate leadership and organizational resilience:
(1) a residential survey
(2) an organizational network mapping initiative
(3) a planning assembly
(4) leadership development.
The SCALE-UP project was co-developed with youth in East Boston (N-YO). The immediate focus was to create resilience for acute and chronic effects of climate change, especially flooding due to hurricanes and sea level rise. The NOAH Youth have developed an understanding of climate science and stresses particular to East Boston and are exploring the ways in which the community can become resilient.
For additional information on NOAH’s Resiliency work, please contact Latifa Zayad at lziyad@noahcdc.org or click here