Connection & Action Sprint
You are about to embark on the work of a lifetime.
If your community is committed to ending homelessness, then consider kicking off your work, or pairing your annual Point-in Time (PiT) Count with a Connection & Action Sprint.
Overview of the Toolkit
Collecting person-specific data is the key to ending homelessness for our most vulnerable (and often anonymous) homeless neighbours. A Connection & Action Sprint is a coordinated outreach process to connect with people experiencing homelessness with resources and supports and engage the broader community in both deepening their understanding of homelessness and taking action. A Connection & Action Sprint can be easily be paired with an annual PiT Count or can be undertaken at anytime to strengthen or kick off your By-Name Data.
This Toolkit walks communities step-by-step through the planning and execution of a local Connection and Action Spring. Information unique to a Connection & Action Sprint and a range of sample forms and templates are included that you can use and adapt for your own local needs. As many elements of a Connections & Action Sprint are similar to a Point-in-Time Count (e.g. forming a leadership team, recruiting and training volunteers, surveying, analyzing data etc.), the Connection & Action Sprint Toolkit also links to Point-in-Time Count resources on the Homelessness Learning Hub, where appropriate.
2021 Joint PiT/Registry Week Guides and Surveys (updated 2024 materials to be provided soon!)
- Point-in-Time Count & Registry Coordination Packet 2021 guidance for conducting a joint PiT/Registry
- Registry Week Quick Links 2021 easy links to key resources to support your Registry Week or joint PiT/Registry
The Toolkit
The toolkit contains a variety of printable and editable files in various formats. All documents mentioned in each section can be found in the “Downloads” area at the bottom of each page. You may also find it helpful to refer to Australia’s Registry Week Toolkit.
- Getting Started
In this section, you will find materials and resource that will help you understand the scope of what a Registry Week entails and plan for each step in the process. - Building a Strong Local Team
The documents listed in this section should give you a good sense of who should be involved in your Registry Week and how you can effectively work together. - Clarifying Your Demand
There are steps that can be taken to estimate the number of people experiencing homelessness in your community and the types of resources and supports they need. This section of the Toolkit is around clarifying that demand. - Volunteers: Planning and Recruitment
In this section of the Toolkit, you’ll find a wealth or materials that will help you with the entire process of recruiting and managing volunteers during your Registry Week. - Mapping Survey Locations
This section of the Toolkit provides you with examples of what some communities have done to map survey locations during their Registry Week. - Budgets and Supplies
There are a variety of costs and supplies that you will need to make this Registry Week a successful initiative, and this section of the Toolkit contains a few sample budgets that you can reference from other communities that have done Registry Weeks.
- Lining Up Housing
Learn how to work on lining up a supply of housing, supports and resources to meet the demand in your community. - Training
Advice on training your volunteers on conducting the survey prior to Registry Week. - Data
This section outlines how to capture individual, line-by-line data of your survey respondents and considerations for displaying and reporting the data. - Headquarters
This section of the Toolkit provides resources for you to create a central headquarters for the Registry Week volunteers and activity coordination. - Survey Packets
All teams that will be doing surveying will need a variety of materials. This section of the Toolkit provides you with a list of helpful items to put in these survey packets. - Community Debrief
A powerful component of the Registry Week will be your community’s ability to share the results of surveying your neighbors experiencing homelessness and to set the stage for the next steps to end homelessness in your community.