Week 2 · Adaptive Planning Program

9. Asset Mapping and Capacity Assessment

30 min

By the end you'll be able to

Apply Asset-Based Community Development principles
Identify and categorize community assets across multiple domains
Integrate community strengths into intervention planning

Public health planning often defaults to a “deficit” model, focusing solely on what a community lacks. This lesson flips the script using Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) to identify the institutions, associations, and individuals that make a community resilient.

We explore how to map these assets and “braid” them into your intervention design to build sustainable, community-led solutions.

Practice quiz

Question 1
What is the core critique that Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD) makes against traditional planning?
- Traditional planning is too expensive to scale internationally.
- Traditional planning defaults to a deficit model that focuses solely on what a community lacks.
- Traditional planning ignores epidemiological surveillance data.
- Traditional planning relies too heavily on randomized trials.
Question 2
Which trio does the lesson identify as the assets ABCD asks planners to map?
- Funders, contractors, and consultants.
- Hospitals, pharmacies, and insurers.
- Institutions, associations, and individuals.
- Counties, cities, and census tracts.
Reflection 3
What does it mean to ‘braid’ community assets into your intervention design, and why does the lesson argue this produces more sustainable solutions?

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