Advocating for change is one of the important functions of human service professionals. In our various communities, these people are engaged in defending and supporting individuals and groups in the society. Therefore, human service professionals have a responsibility of helping people accomplish tasks, which would be difficult without any form of assistance. With links to social justice, advocacy is important for societal change and development. The human services professionals should change the attitude of people for them to implement change. Since people are always reluctant, they should show them the need for change. Thus, this paper explains an action plan to implement change in the community.
Need for change and mission
Homelessness is one of the biggest problem the society faces currently. Some of the reasons behind this social problem are domestic violence, unemployment, alcohol addiction, mental illness, and even natural disasters. Even though people view homelessness differently, it is the situation where an individual has no home hence living on the streets. While many assume homelessness is due to poverty, issues such as mental problem and drug abuse also contribute. As such, there should be societal changes that would solve this problem that has grown gradually over the years. Statistics in the United States department of housing shows the relationship between homelessness and mental illness (Walsh et al., 2016) . Therefore, the human services professionals should address this problem at the grassroots. Using this strategy, it becomes easy to come up with lasting solution to the homelessness tragedy in the society. Due to complexities involved in this societal problem, it has become difficult for the government to reach homeless individuals. Notably, the mission of the project is to ensure no one is homeless. This can be achieved through addressing the issues that result in homelessness. There should be effective programs to address the problem of mental illness and homelessness. Using such strategies, it will be easier to solve the crisis.
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Model of community change
For this societal problem, the preferred model for change would be building capacity for community change. The first step would be to understand the context of the societal problem. This will involves the experiences of the people and how they end up being homeless. After understanding the context, it becomes easier to formulate a plan that would create a successful interventions. By having a common vision and action steps, the community will definitely realize the desired change. The model follows the principle of community and system change. For the programs to attain their objectives of getting rid of the homeless, the people should accept the changes. There should be new programs different from the existing ones that would drive change in the community. The community must change their way of life to get rid of the homelessness problem. It should include a change of policy and adjusting to new practices that would accommodate even the mentally ill to have homes. Apart from that, this change model acknowledge the importance of using risk factors to drive change. The risk factors are the elements in the environment that increases the probability of the problem to recur. By creating a change in the environment it translates directly to a change of behavior. After changing the community environment, there should be programs that would increase employment rates and incomes.
Behavioral and population level objectives
The community should experience various behavioral changes to change the homeless trend. First, there should be a change of attitude towards home ownership. Development of saving programs should be created to ensure even the small income owners have the chance to own a home. Conducting public campaigns is important to educate the masses on the possibility of owning homes. On the same note, studies show that many Americans are working but are still homeless in the streets. Many of them even sleep in their cars because they cannot afford to rent a simple house. This clearly indicates that mass education is necessary, especially when it comes living healthy lives. As a result, people will be able to learn on the different ways that they can use in managing their little money. Secondly, there is a direct relationship between mental illness and homelessness in the United States (Nichols, 2016) . This confirm that being homeless is a societal problem that requires collective responsibility. The programs should build mental homes to manage individuals of mental illness. Instead being on the streets, policies should be developed to accommodate them in mental clinics. As a result, others may be well enough to go on with their lives. These strategies will change the perception regarding the mentally ill people. In fact, even the family will start caring for them. Human service professionals have the responsibilities of ensuring the society is a better place. There objectives is to ensure proper management of societal problems such as homelessness and drug abuse. Since drug abuse contribute to homelessness, human service professionals should develop working rehab institutions to admit drug addicts.
The population level objectives must aim at ensuring homelessness is reduced significantly in the community. To achieve this, the human service professionals should aim at addressing the causes of homelessness. This includes unemployment, alcohol addiction, mental illness and management of natural disasters among others. A task force should be developed to ensure that individuals are not vulnerable to the extent they end up without homes. The community change model should work in line with state agencies to find lasting solution for homelessness.
Accomplishing the mission and objectives
To get rid of the homelessness tragedy, the human services professionals should implement various strategies. First, development of houses is the foundation of ending homelessness. Some people in the streets lacks the finances to enable them build a house. As such, provision of houses will give them a chance to own a home. There should be collaboration between the human services professionals and the government to offer affordable housing to the people. Secondly, the taskforce should offer essential services to the community to address issues such as alcohol addiction and mental illness. They should create hospital and rehab institution to admit such individuals and get them out of the streets. Thirdly, the human services professionals should create a campaign on social connecters. This will encourage social inclusion to de-stigmatize mental illness and poverty. Having such thinking will play an important role in ending homelessness. No doubt, the implementation of these strategies will play an important role in ending this societal problem.
Action steps
The actions steps in this process will involve different parties including the state agencies. First, the people should be the first priority in creating change, especially because the problems concerns them. Secondly, the model will create a common purpose for the entire population to ensure there is a common objective. Using such strategy, people will be ambitious towards creating an inclusive society. No doubt, using this course of action will make it possible for the human services professionals to attain their objectives.
Values and attitudes
As a human services professionals, I have values and attitudes that would enhance change in the community. First, they provide services to everyone in the society without discrimination based on race, gender, and sexual orientation among others (Edwards & Seck, 2018) . This values allows an individual to provide necessary services to deserving individuals in the society. For instance, allocation of houses to the homeless will not have any discrimination basis. The second value of human services professionals is the social justice. Accordingly, they get rid of oppression in the society by empowering the poor and the mentally ill. This value is important in solving many societal problems. Thirdly, human services professionals have the attitude of ensuring the society is better. As a result, they are ambitious in solving the most pressing societal problems that includes homelessness. Thus, this shows that the human services professional possess values and attitudes that can change the society.
Conclusion
Conclusively, the human services professionals have the power to cause societal change in solving problems. However, the community should uphold values and attitudes to meet their objectives. This includes creating an inclusive environment that accepts the poor and mentally ill as their own. As a result, problems such as homelessness will be something of the past. State agencies should work closely with human services professionals to find lasting solutions for these concerns. Such collaborations has a huge potential in making the society a better place.
References
Edwards, A., & Seck, M. M. (2018). Ethnicity, Values, and Value Conflicts of African American and White Social Service Professionals. Journal of Social Work Values and Ethics , 15 (2).
Nichols, N. (2016). Investigating the Social Relations of Human Service Provision: Institutional Ethnography and Activism. Journal of Comparative Social Work , 11 (1).
Walsh, C. A., Lorenzetti, L., St-Denis, N., Murwisi, P., & Lewis, T. (2016). Community Voices: Insights on Social and Human Services From People with Lived Experiences of Homelessness. Review of Social Sciences , 1 (2), 27-41.
