100 Things You Can Do To Build Social
Capital
1. Organize a social gathering to welcome a
new neighbor
2. Attend town meetings
3. Register to vote and vote
4. Support local merchants
5. Volunteer your special skills to an
organization
6. Donate blood
7. Start a community garden
8. Mentor someone of a different ethnic or
religious group
9. Surprise a new neighbor by making a
favorite dinner–and include the recipe
10. Tape record your parents' earliest
recollections and share them with your children
11. Plan a vacation with friends or family
12. Don't gossip
13. Help fix someone's flat tire
14. Organize or participate in a sports
league
15. Join a gardening club
16. Attend home parties when invited
17. Become an organ donor
18. Attend your children's athletic contests,
plays and recitals
19. Get to know your children's teachers
20. Join the local Elks, Kiwanis, or Knights
of Columbus
21. Get involved with Brownies or
Cub/Boy/Girl Scouts
22. Start a monthly tea group
23. Speak at or host a monthly brown bag
lunch series at your local library
24. Sing in a choir
25. Get to know the clerks and salespeople at
your local stores
26. Attend PTA meetings
27. Audition for community theater or
volunteer to usher
28. Give your park a weatherproof
chess/checkers board
29. Play cards with friends or neighbors
30. Give to your local food bank
31. Participate in walk-a-thons
32. Employers: encourage
volunteer/community groups to hold meetings on your site
33. Volunteer in your child's classroom or
chaperone a field trip
34. Join or start a babysitting cooperative
35. Attend school plays
36. Answer surveys when asked
37. Businesses: invite local
government officials to speak at your workplace
38. Attend Memorial Day parades and express
appreciation for others
39. Form a local outdoor activity group
40. Participate in political campaigns
41. Attend a local budget committee meeting
42. Form a computer group for local senior
citizens
43. Help coach Little League or other youth
sports – even if you don't have a kid playing
44. Help run the snack bar at the Little
League field
45. Form a "tools cooperative" with
neighbors and share ladders, snow blowers, etc.
46. Start a lunch gathering or a discussion
group with co-workers
47. Offer to rake a neighbor's yard or shovel
his/her walk
48. Join a carpool
49. Employers: give employees
time (e.g., 3 days per year to work on civic projects)
50. Plan a "Walking Tour" of a
local historic area
51. Eat breakfast at a local gathering spot
on Saturdays
52. Have family dinners and read to your
children
53. Run for public office
54. Stop and make sure the person on the side
of the highway is OK
55. Host a block party or a holiday open
house
56. Start a fix-it group–friends
willing to help each other clean, paint, garden, etc.
57. Offer to serve on a town committee
58. Join the volunteer fire department
59. Go to church...or temple...or go outside
with your children–talk to them about spirituality
60. If you grow tomatoes, plant extra for an
lonely elder who lives nearby – better yet, ask him/her to teach you and
others how to can the extras
61. Ask a single diner to share your table
for lunch
62. Stand at a major intersection holding a
sign for your favorite candidate
63. Persuade a local restaurant to have a
designated "meet people" table
64. Host a potluck supper before your Town
Meeting
65. Take dance lessons with a friend
66. Say "thanks" to public servants
– police, firefighters, town clerk…
67. Fight to keep essential local services in
the downtown area–your post office, police station, school, etc.
68. Join a nonprofit board of directors
69. Gather a group to clean up a local park
or cemetery
70. When somebody says "government
stinks," suggest they help fix it
71. Turn off the TV and talk with friends or
family
72. Hold a neighborhood barbecue
73. Bake cookies for new neighbors or work
colleagues
74. Plant tree seedlings along your street
with neighbors and rotate care for them
75. Volunteer at the library
76. Form or join a bowling team
77. Return a lost wallet or appointment book
78. Use public transportation and start
talking with those you regularly see
79. Ask neighbors for help and reciprocate
80. Go to a local folk or crafts festival
81. Call an old friend
82. Register for a class – then go
83. Accept or extend an invitation
84. Talk to your kids or parents about their
day
85. Say hello to strangers
86. Log off and go to the park
87. Ask a new person to join a group for a
dinner or an evening
88. Participate in pot luck meals
89. Volunteer to drive someone
90. Say hello when you spot an acquaintance
in a store
91. Host a movie night
92. Exercise together or take walks with
friends or family
93. Assist with or create your town or
neighborhood's newsletter
94. Organize a neighborhood litter pick-up
– with lawn games afterwards
95. Collect oral histories from older town
residents
96. Join a book club discussion or get the
group to discuss local issues
97. Volunteer to deliver Meals-on-Wheels in
your neighborhood
98. Start a children’s story hour at your
local library
99. Be real. Be humble. Acknowledge others'
self-worth
100. Tell friends and family about social
capital and why it matters
Source: Saguaro Seminar on Civic
Engagement in America. John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard
University, 79 JFK St., Cambridge, MA 02138 (www.bettertogether.org).
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