Community Network Readiness Assessment Handbook

Community networks still face many challenges in areas such as regulations, funding, sustainability, and community engagement. So the road to building a community network itself has three major challenges: Introducing communities to the concept of community networks. Assessing whether a community will benefit from and be able to sustain a community network. Planning and building the network. This Readiness Assessment Handbook is designed to address the second and third challenges above: assessing community network readiness and planning and building the network. It is aimed at Africa-based practitioners and organizations who want to expand into community networks. The book also features an appendix with a directory of courses and resources useful at various stages of such assessment and planning—and what comes next. The readiness assessment is part of a larger process towards developing a community network. It starts from the already existing work (or background) of the team taking on this assessment and ends at a fully operational community network. This process is not necessarily linear. In some cases, certain stages may need to be repeated.