Age-Friendly Forsyth is made up of a variety of organizational partners, including health care and other non-profits, corporate, education, and philanthropic agencies, alongside community members, who have spearheaded local planning efforts through the Age-Friendly Forsyth initiative. Currently Age-Friendly Forsyth is working with key stakeholders to engage residents and the broader community.
Objective
Age-Friendly Forsyth is a program of Senior Services that engages and informs aging adults and community partners to create a livable community through strategic collaborative planning.
Goal
Aging adults in Forsyth County to live their best lives.
History
A group of Forsyth County business and education leaders met and determined that aging needed to be a priority in our community. This group looked to Senior Services to develop a way to elevate the topic of aging. In 2016, Senior Services began convening a wide variety of stakeholders to form a research collaborative including more than one hundred organizational and community members that led county-wide research activities. Nonprofit, corporate, educational, philanthropic organizational partners, and community partners from across the county were involved in the research and planning processes. A survey of more than 1,000 Forsyth County residents, age 60+, was conducted.
In March of 2017, Age-Friendly Forsyth hosted three World Café-style Community Conversation events involving more than 120 people. These research activities led to a “state of aging” report.
Key findings from the report were presented to the community at a Planning Symposium, where more than one hundred community members gathered to provide direction on priority focus areas for the initiative moving forward. Organizational and community members developed the process, structure, and resident engagement components of the collaborative initiative and the process resulted in the 2020-2025 Forsyth County Action Plan for Aging Adults.