Community Work

Community Visioning. Engaging People. Building Relationships. Facilitating Change.

My Philosophy

The key to successful engagement strategies is to create situations where both learning and connection happen at the same time.

Bringing people together in a context where interactive learning takes place generates new ideas. Learning and connection happen informally when people bump into each other and share information. But if it happens on another level, that is, the level of collective action which links a web of relationships and builds something in the social interest, new ideas of what is possible and desirable come into being. That’s called vision.

Our shared desire for that vision drives our desire for change. If we act on that desire together, we build our capacity, both individually and as a community.

Learn about some of Eleanor's projects below:

Visioning a Greater Racine - Eleanor served as Racine's Visioning Coach

Visioning a Greater Racine (VGR) is a networked community initiative using the proven VISIONING process with the goal of transforming Racine into a flourishing place all residents are proud to call home. Learn more at Visioningagreaterracine.org and on their Facebook page.

Visioning a Great Racine (VGR) revealed the goals from the community-wide visioning process in October 2017 to a packed house.

VGR kicked off task forces, called W.A.V.E.Teams (Working, Action, Visioning & Engagement), to carry out the community’s vision.

Click through the images below to explore greater Racine's Goals & Sub-goals complied from over 1300 community members.

Comeback City: Chattanoogans Take a Stand for a Cleaner, Better City

Documentary of Chattanooga’s Transformation, 2017, Griffin Ball

Eleanor is interviewed by Griffin Ball for this documentary on Chattanooga’s dramatic transformation from a polluted, racially-divided, post-industrial city to today. Ball’s documentary won the South East Tennessee regional competition for National History Day 2017. Ball is a student at the McCallie School, Chattanooga TN.

Chattanooga Connected: Building Interracial Relationships

TV video on Chattanooga’s Interracial Community Conversations, 8 minutes, Mar 22, 2016, by WTCI, Chattanooga PBS affiliate

Our country has a long and difficult history with race relations. Starting in 2013, Eleanor, along with her husband and cousins Franklin and Tresa McCallie, founded Chattanooga Connected, a bi-racial group working intentionally to build relationships across race lines. The local public television station did this video on their approach, based on telling our stories and hearing each other’s life experiences related to race.

The CBS Evening News aired this 3 minute segment on Chattanooga Connected, July 2015.

Chattanooga: Community With A Vision

This 12-minute video shows Chattanooga’s visioning process during ReVision 2000. It demonstrates the process in action and includes interviews with participants and leaders, including Bob Corker and Mai Bell Hurley. Documentary by Anne Macksoud of Leonardo’s Children. Executive Producer Eleanor McCallie Cooper. 1993.

A Chattanooga Times Free Press series, Sept 2017

by Joan Garrett Maclane & Joy Lukachick Smith.

Photo by Doug Strickland

The Lost Way — "Nearly 40 years ago, an idiosyncratic multimillionaire, a North Chattanooga housewife and a tribe of idealistic baby boomers formed an unlikely alliance to rebuild a once-great Southern city. The world says they succeeded. But did they really? And could it all be happening again?"

Read Full Article Here