Rural Support Partners, mission-driven management consultants with a participatory approach to create lasting, equitable change in rural areas. Rural community and economic development.

Tools & Resources 

Rural Community and Economic Development Tools for Participatory Change

This section of our website is where you’ll find tools and resources for rural community and economic development. These resources are designed by RSP to improve the practice of participatory change and participatory rural development by sharing what we’ve learned from our work across Central Appalachia. Every month, we post resources including those that help ground you in the concepts that guide our work, planning tools, and occasional case studies of what’s worked and lessons we’ve learned along the way. These resources are intended for people doing similar participatory community, organizational, or network development to bring about system change, particularly in rural communities. Sign up at the bottom of the page to receive a notification about new posts when we send out our newsletter.

Categories

Creative Placemaking in Central Appalachia

Creative Placemaking in Central Appalachia

November 6, 2020
Central Appalachia has been employing creative placemaking for decades, if not centuries, just not necessarily by that name. We conducted…
Rural Networks for Wealth Creation

Rural Networks for Wealth Creation

November 6, 2020
Rural Support Partners conducted an in-depth study of collective impact networks working to create wealth that sticks in rural communities.…
So You Want to Build a Collective Impact Network?

So You Want to Build a Collective Impact Network?

November 6, 2020
RSP developed a toolkit to guide groups of organizations intending to build effective and sustainable collective impact networks. Start your…
Core Elements of a Network

Core Elements of a Network

April 6, 2018
Rural Support Partners identified the building blocks of successful networks in rural-based organizations for wealth creation and how their experiences…
Nonprofit Collaboration

Nonprofit Collaboration

March 7, 2017
Our most challenging social problems are too complex to change by the efforts of any single program, organization, or sector.…
What is a Social Enterprise?

What is a Social Enterprise?

February 2, 2017
Social enterprise is about solving old problems in new ways. In persistently distressed communities, social enterprises can explore and grow…
Spiral Model of Popular Education

Spiral Model of Popular Education

February 2, 2017
The Spiral Model is a grounding concept RSP uses to facilitate collaborative group processes. Using the model, we draw out…
Nonprofit Leadership in the Rural Southeast

Nonprofit Leadership in the Rural Southeast

January 6, 2017
Nonprofits in rural places receive far less funding per capita than their urban counterparts, so they have to do more…
What is a Value Chain?

What is a Value Chain?

January 5, 2017
In rural areas across Appalachia, economic development has often led to profits for large, outside companies with little benefit to…

Keep up to date with our newsletter

Sign up for RSP and The New School's newsletter to receive updates from RSP, course and programming announcements from The New School, and tools and resources gathered and developed by our team with 50 years of combined experience in nonprofit and social-enterprise management, philanthropy, network development, and community development finance.

Management - Strategy - Collaboration

Rural Support Partners equips changemakers, organizations, and networks to cultivate lasting, equitable, participatory change in rural areas.

Rural Support Partners. All Rights Reserved.