Dephi Method Decision Making

The Delphi method allows a group to anonymously reply to questionnaires and receive feedback. This helps to reduce the range of responses and arrive at something closer to “expert consensus.” In determining the needs for a community garden a small group of myself and two classmates went through this process.
Community Garden with Volunteers

Community Garden Needs

The goal of a community garden is to contribute to the food provision, health, economy, and environment of an area. Community gardens bring people together and encourage safe and healthy environments.

 Meet the Group

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Delphi Decision Making Group

Together we anonymously (and then, not so anonymously) shared our ideas for priorities of a community garden on a local, regional, and global scale.

 

 

 

 

Results

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Left: Class total, Right: Group total

The class’ priorities were walkability, educational outreach, and healthy lifestyles and food choices. Our group followed closely with the priorities matching walkability and educational outreach, but varying with a unanimous agreement that gentrification is a priority.

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Left: Class total, Right: Group total

For the regional scale, our group’s priorities matched exactly with that of the class’. This demonstrates how the Delphi method can lead to a more expert agreement. Since access to water source, loss of protected areas, and socioeconomic inequalities were all chosen as priorities, they must be imperative to the success of a community garden.

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Left: Class total, Right: Group total

The global impact of a community garden can be hard to judge. This is a general outline of the goals a community garden should aspire to achieve. Once again, our smaller group matches up with the class as a whole. The top three priorities are conservation of forest lands, water quantity and quality, and biodiversity.

These prioritizations guide the final step of the project. The redesign of the HOPE Garden! By knowing what a community garden should accomplish on all these scales, we can better judge and suggest designs for our own local garden. Check out the final project to see how it’s done!