Editor’s note: This commentary is by Jamie Gage, who is general manager of Vermont Information Consortium and board chair of Global Campuses Foundation.
In recent years in Vermont, the theme of collaboration has begun to reverberate in all areas of our culture, including in the private, public and nonprofit arenas. It seems that every successful project impacting a community or population these days has behind it a core group of committed individuals who have come together from different walks of life to create lasting change.
Across the state, forward-thinking professionals are reaching out to professionals in other economic sectors — whether for-profit, nonprofit, or government — to build innovative solutions to societal problems and forge partnerships to help sustainability overall. In Vermont, the emergence of B-Corps, socially responsible businesses and Results-Based Accountability are beginning to measure success in different ways than the traditional capitalist model or the so-called ”bottom line.” This in turn helps expand the possibilities for finding solutions at lower costs, and with better results.
This merging of boundaries and goals in Vermont is rooted in the Town Meeting Day tradition where citizens voice wildly different perspectives on their communities, yet come together at the end of the day through compromise to help move their town forward. This seems to be what distinguishes us from much of the rest of the country; indeed, barter economies, peer-to-peer learning, online forums, and the localvore and farm-to-school movements in Vermont are all variations of this tradition grounded in the tenets of pragmatism, awareness, and compromise.
Overwhelmed by the daily cacophony of messages through our phones, laptops, and TVs, specialized Web tools such as Front Porch Forum and Basecamp help people navigate the maze of available data to get at the information that matters to them most.
And strong collaboration in the Age of Information is now being aided by technology in new and important ways. Overwhelmed by the daily cacophony of messages through our phones, laptops, and TVs, specialized Web tools such as Front Porch Forum and Basecamp help people navigate the maze of available data to get at the information that matters to them most. Such tools help provide a more nuanced understanding of issues, and better transparency and stewardship of data overall.
Recently the state of Vermont earned an “A” ranking from USPIRG in part for its transparency efforts related to its partnerships with state agencies, nonprofits, and others in launching its new website spotlight.vermont.gov. The state’s creation of a new Chief Performance Office to lead this initiative underscores this spirit of collaboration, and similar efforts are afoot in dozens of communities around the state.
And they need to be. With the confluence of so many serious issues facing us in the areas of energy and economics and the environment, it’s becoming clearer now more than ever that people need to band together – to talk but also to listen – in order that we build a healthier, more sustainable future. Vermont can serve as a model.
