Photovoice Training for Impactful Community-Led Action and Storytelling

With help from photovoice training, a method which pairs photography and narratives to document community needs and resources, the Jane Goodall Institute is sending out roots (and shoots) of compassionate storytelling through our global network! 

Dr. Jane Goodall began Roots & Shoots when a small group of students came up to her front porch in Tanzania and told her how they were worried about the problems in their communities. They shared that they felt helpless, and like they inherited so many problems that they could do nothing about. Jane encouraged them to start small, with the issues that immediately impacted their community, and showed how every one of them could make a difference for people, other animals, and the environment. Today, 🔗 Roots & Shoots, works with young people in 70 countries to connect them to issues in their communities, and inspire them to make a difference! 

At the beginning of 2024, the Roots & Shoots coordinators from ten JGI offices, including JGI Tanzania, the Republic of the Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Uganda, and USA, met in Zanzibar for a week of learning supported by the 🔗 Templeton Foundation . One area that these team leads trained on is something called photovoice — an approach to community-led projects where community members use cameras as a tool to help them visually express their perspectives, thoughts, and experiences. 

Now at the end of 2024, these Roots & Shoots leads have had a chance to spread their learnings among their countries' Roots & Shoots groups! Coordinators integrated photovoice exercises into new and ongoing projects, encouraging young people to identify and express their hopes and concerns around their community. In the photo above, young Roots & Shoots members in the DRC decided to pose with a chicken to show their compassion for other animals, and to encourage husbandry best practices among local entrepreneurs. 

After taking photos that represented causes that were important to them — either by setting up a more abstract scene or capturing a real moment — the students got to work on their captions. To help them express the messages behind their photos, students were given the following prompts: 

• What does compassionate action among youth look like? 

• What nurtures or contributes to compassionate action in youth? 

• What evidence do you have of youth compassionate action? 

• What action can be taken in our community to help youth thrive? 

Here are some of the results of their hard work: 

And this is only a small selection of the students’ stories!  

This method of storytelling integrates easily with JGI’s Tacare approach to community-led conservation, which puts the experiences and perspectives of local people at the center of our work, with help from the latest technology.  

For many participants, this was their first time using Esri’s phone app Survey123 to submit observations to their respective JGI offices. By tracking these stories in a more permanent way, we can better understand the issues facing communities we work with, the values that guide their daily lives, and the creative solutions that we can support. It's amazing to see what Roots & Shoots groups around the world are already accomplishing with this new method of data collection! 

Do you have a story of impact to share? Add your story and photos to our Tapestry of Hope to inspire others to make a difference in their communities! 

Photo credits, in order of appearance: JGI DRC, JGI RoC, JGI Uganda, JGI Tanzania

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