Grass Roots: The Best Way to Improve Health

Synopsis: Rather than involve members of the priority population in planning, implementing, and evaluating new programs, services, or policies, many organizations plan new things in isolation as if they know best. This top-down approach leads to a lack of involvement of gate-keepers, stake-holders, a lack of “buy-in,” ownership, and capacity in the priority population. Ultimately, this leads to programs and services that are not sustainable over time.

Learning Objectives: After reading and learning from this resource guide, you will be able to:

1.  Define a top-down approach.
2. Describe why a top-down approach leads to failure.
3. Define a grass roots, bottoms up approach.
4. Describe why a grass roots approach typically leads to success.
5. Explain how program sustainability is linked to a grass roots approach.