The Ripple Effect: How Change Spreads in Communities (2015)

About: A nationwide study prepared by the Harwood Institute for Public Innovation in collaboration with the Kettering Foundation.

Author: Richard C. Harwood 

Publish Date: 2015

Description: The Ripple Effect is about how change happens in communities. It comes at a time when people throughout the country yearn to find alternatives to prolonged political gridlock, toxic public discourse and mistrust in a whole host of institutions, organizations, and leaders. At a time when significant trends, which have emerged over previous decades, are reshaping society – including dramatic shifts in family structure, widening income gaps, an uneven economy that undermines the vitality of many communities and poor education systems that fail to give many youth a real shot at the American Dream.

But how does such change happen – and spread?. Read this report about what The Harwood Institute, with support from the Kettering Foundation, found when they sought to answer this question.