Practical Implementation

There are common implementation practices across approaches to Social Network Health in different contexts.

Here we will describe precautions and historical knowledge that will influence any approach to Social Network Health.

Precautions:

Partial Approach:

Partial Implementations of successful approaches to social network health have beek known to be unpredictable at best and typically harmful. Without implementing all of the key action findings in social network health, it is likely that a net negative outcome for community health will result. All of the key action findings are necessary but insufficient on their own.

For example, if a community implements a preventative mental health program that is not ecologically valid, then even with all nine other key action findings correctly implemented, the program is unlikely to see success. That would be a net negative outcome leading to lost resources and potentially cynicism that could stand in the way of future efforts.

Expertise:

At all levels of approach implementation, it is necessary to enter in with expert knowledge of training. Without a master-level trainer in the room, it is entirely possible to incorrectly sequence approach scaffolding or an individual activity, such that a negative outcome is experienced.

A negative training cascade can also occur when an expert trainer trains a less experienced trainer, and that less experienced trainer is then allowed to train other trainers before they themselves are experts. This is a common problem often associated with "voltage drop".

Scope of Implementation:

TBD - Note: Sups need to know what they are getting into. Consistency is a key finding in Social Network Health - that and the precaution of partial implementation are a stark reality check to anyone looking for a quick fix. We should outline the scope of historically successful implementations here, as concisely as possible.

History of Practice:

Note: We could go a few ways with this section - we could cover historical examples of program implementations here - successes and failures, or, we could move this entire section to the research page, and just cover the history of research.

This is really an existential question for this site. This toolkit, generally, picks up where research leaves off and stops where implementation gets specific to an implementation. We can therefore fully describe approaches, but not programs. We reference research, but we don't conduct new research.

The section below, on SEL, was an attempt to consider historical phases of development of approaches. That is different from historical programs. That is different from historical research. It may or may not be possible to complete in a useful way.

SEL

In the parlance of Social Emotional Learning in US schools there Tiers - Tier 1 (prevention-based) comes before Tier 3 (isolation-based) because it is, colloquially, terrible to have to isolate people - generally, Tier 1 is the success case and Tier 3 is the last line of defense for individuals who need it. This is appropriate prioritization from the perspective of a social network health approach. In practical implementation, however, far fewer communities put as many resources into effective Tier 1 programming as Tier 3.

Fundamental Principles of Practice:

TBD - Note: