Four Worlds
 
FOUR WORLDS CENTER FOR DEVELOPMENT LEARNING
 
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16 PRINCIPLES FUNCTIONS SECTORS    
 
Four Worlds

SECTORS

The four key functions are carried out in the following sectors:

SECTOR:
EDUCATION AND TRAINING

1. Community Development

2. Community Health

3. Education and Training

4.Social and Economic Development Planning

5. Governance and Civil Society

6.Community Economic Development

7.Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)

 

SECTOR: EDUCATION AND TRAINING

Our work in the education and training sector has focused on both the design and delivery of learning programs for human and community development and on the development of curricula and learning programs for schools and higher education for Indigenous and disadvantaged communities.

TRAINING

We have designed and delivered training programs for a wide range of audiences and purposes including community level people, professional and development agencies, NGOs, and government departments at the local, regional and national levels. Topics for training have ranged from community healing and development, program management, and specific development issues such as sexual abuse, ethnic conflict, poverty alleviation, HIV/AIDS, integrated community health and governance to hands-on coaching in the midst of ongoing program development.

We have also developed formal programs at the college and university level:

  • The University of Lethbridge Native Teacher Training Program
  • Native Human Service Workers Certificate Program, Lethbridge Community College
  • an accredited masters program to train leaders in human and community development (Applied Human and Community Development), Alliant International University, Fresno, California
  • Bachelor level and community college certificate programs for Aboriginal community development leaders with Algoma University College and Laurentian University







 





CURRICULUM DEVELOPMENT FOR SCHOOLS

We have developed a broad range of culturally based curriculum pieces for schools. Our unique contribution in this area is addressing critical social issues such as ethnic conflict, substance abuse, and HIV/AIDS prevention through school curriculum.

The Sacred Tree explores universal human values in a First Nations context and is used as a guide for personal growth, for native studies, and life skills courses. It is in its 21st edition and has been translated into German, Spanish, and Russian and French. It is used in schools along with an extensive curriculum package. This book was named to the "Top 100 books of the millennia" by the Canadian Library Association.

Our Walking with Grandfather curriculum package is based on a video series which depicts traditional legends from a variety of tribal backgrounds which were produced with funding from Public Broadcasting Services in the United States.

Our Unity in Diversity curriculum package was developed for the Alberta Government to address ethnic conflict at the junior and senior high school levels.

Our group of highly trained and experienced educators can be mobilized to develop custom training programs or school curriculum for clients.

INTERVENTIONS IN SCHOOL SYSTEMS

We have often been called upon to assist school systems and to intervene in crisis situations by school administrators and boards of directors. This has involved teacher training, staff interventions, board training, program evaluations, and fostering community participation in education, as well comprehensive educational evaluations, leading to the reforming and reorienting of schooling participation in Indigenous communities.

SAMPLE PROJECTS

Canada
The design and accreditation (with Algoma University College and Laurentian University) of a six-module training program for Aboriginal community leadership focused on human and community development implementation. This program was designed in consultation with community leadership, piloted and refined in delivery to five successive cohorts of learners, and is currently being delivered in two other First Nation communities in the context of comprehensive community planning implementation. (2005-present)

Pakistan
The creation of a Development Leadership Training Institute characterized by three annual learning and development forums bringing together 100 selected community leaders (men, women and youth from 34 villages across the Gojal region of northern Hunza, Pakistan population 25,000). The design and delivery of the six training courses and the curriculum materials and manuals they require, the extension of this learning through collaborative “learning and action circles” at the village level to more than 1000 community activists, the provision of small seed project grants to provide