Intentionally walking beside neighbors through loving relationships and strategic development to accomplish the holistic transformation of neighborhoods in Shawnee County.
Empowering Local Solutions
We recognize that outsiders can't solve community challenges alone. Traditional top-down approaches often fall short. That's why we take a grassroots approach, collaborating with residents to identify existing strengths and partner with them to create long-term, positive change. We believe the most creative and sustainable solutions come from the very neighborhoods they impact.
SENT's 7 Core Values
The most creative long-term solutions are coming from grassroots and community efforts - from people who see themselves as ambassadors in their neighborhoods and communities.
"Go to the people, live among them, learn from them, love them. Start with what they know, build on what they have: but of the best leaders, when their task is done, the people will remark, 'We have done it ourselves.'" - Ancient Chinese Proverb
"…it is far better to enter the neighborhood as a learner than an initiator." - Robert D. Lupton, Toxic Charity
"Authentic relationships with those in need have a way of correcting the we-will-rescue-you mind-set and replacing it with mutual admiration and respect." - Robert D. Lupton
“For most, reconciliation will not happen as a part of a normal course of events. It has to be intentional.” ― Wayne Gordon, Do All Lives Matter?
"Community transformation is about the quality of neighbors, not the quality of programs." - Robert D. Lupton, Charity Detox
“Misery (misère), the French sociologist Eugène Buret once remarked, “is poverty felt morally.”
― Matthew Desmond, Poverty, by America
"The gifts that we discovered multiplied. We were pleased to see that neighbors reached out to each other more often. And neighbors who used the gifts of other neighbors began to see the abundance that was both around them and within themselves. Also, when people from outside the neighborhood went “inside” and hired someone to cook a meal, or bought a piece of art, or got their nails done, they began to see ostensibly needy people as artists, economists, musicians, chefs, and entrepreneurs." - Excerpted from “Having Nothing, Possessing Everything: Finding Abundant Communities in Unexpected Places,” by Michael Mather
"If poverty persists in America, it is not for lack of resources." - Matthew Desmond
"Mercy combined with justice creates: immediate care with a future plan, emergency relief and responsible development, short-term intervention and long-term involvement, heart responses and engaged minds." - Robert D. Lupton (Toxic Charity)
"We don't heal in isolation, but in community" - S.Kelley Harrell
"Helping strategies, if indeed they are to be ultimately helpful, demand careful examination of long-term implications. There is no guarantee that unexamined charity will have a redemptive outcome simply because it ‘seems right’ or feels good to the giver." - Robert D. Lupton, Charity Detox
We do this through our 3 Core Strategies
How do we do this?
We operate with a strengths-based approach, continually identifying what we have and how we are growing. We recognize that key resources, like early childhood education, the Southside Filling Station, the Beat the Heat Initiative, and Mental Health Support Groups, help bridge the gap between where we are and where we want to be.
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. -