Food

Amber Cannon feels most energized when she looks back over the last few months that she’s been active in her community and realizes the mental health issues she’s struggled with in the past have lessened considerably. “Since I’ve been involved...

“I’m incredibly energized by the power of simple things,” Evangeline Hammond says. “By little things having the power to change people’s lives, and bring beauty to neighbourhoods. Soccer programs. Potlucks. Just sharing food.” She’s not talking hypothetically. She’s talking about a...

In Nebraska, a group of visionary volunteers got together to do something about supporting community development in the state’s small towns. Their goal was to raise $25 million in ten years. That was in 1993. Today, the Nebraska Community Foundation...

Through a growing network of ambitious people, Nebraska Community Foundation uses shared ideas, resources and experiences to help local leaders unleash the abundant assets and talents within their own place. In other words, they help hometowns turn up their...

In 1968 Robert Kennedy critiqued the Gross National Product (GNP) as a flawed measure of progress; he noted that the GNP measures everything (in money terms) "except that which makes worth while." Our work is motivated by Kennedy’s challenge:...

Pioneering economist Mark Anielski outlines the pitfalls of relying on gross domestic product (GDP) as a measure of societal wealth. Instead, we need to measure the things that matter most to us to really understand how we're doing. And...

Here are three major ways that I see the idea of simplicity presented in today’s popular media: 1. Crude or Regressive Simplicity The mainstream media often shows simplicity as a path of regress instead of progress. Simplicity is frequently presented as anti-­technology and anti-­innovation,...

1. 100,000 homes so far Teams of volunteers across the country hit the streets early in the morning to put a name and a face to the long-term homeless in their communities. The volunteers started canvassing at 4 a.m., combing...

We did a piece some time ago about Joan Horwitt and her idea to teach school kids how to grow lettuce. Then she gave them all packs of seeds to take home and teach their parents how to do...

More than two years ago, Gary Robbins, Meagan Lauer and I got together after an ASG  monthly gathering and decided to work on a few common interests together. One item was to develop a workshop where the three of...