Developing Community Assessments

What is a Community Assessment? Community Assessment: Involves comprehensive information gathering, analysis and documentation to understand a community's concerns, effectively characterize its needs and respond with appropriate interventions. Discovering those things that matter to the community, what issues the community feels are most important to address, and what resources are available to bring about change may be accomplished through interviews with community members, and by conducting listening sessions, public forums, and other place-based research, resulting in an assessment (or profile) of the community that helps identify and prioritize critical issues and plan future interventions.

Community Assessment Steps Overview Talk with internal stakeholders Develop a timeline and research plan Analyze existing data Conduct your own research Combine research to make recommendations

Talk with Internal Stakeholders Meet with other Staff, Board Members, Food Bank Staff, etc. Discuss Scope & Goals of the Community Assessment. Populations/ Demographics Reached Services Needed Sample Questions: What is our strategy for addressing health/nutrition needs and/or economic instability of clients? What are your expectations for the community assessment? What insights do you hope to gain from the community assessment? What types of partnerships do you think would most benefit our clients in the areas of health/nutrition and/or economic opportunity?

Develop a Timeline and Research Plan Identifying Available Resources: Guiding questions for identifying resources: What stakeholders do I need to bring into the process? What data sources am I going to use? Where am I going to obtain my data from? If I am conducting my own research through a survey or focus groups, what resources will I need to accomplish these tasks? Defining Objectives and Strategies: An objective is a long-range aim. It must be specific and realistic. You can have multiple goals or objectives for your community assessment, but each objective will require a different set of strategies. A strategy is a specific deliverable you need to accomplish to reach your objective. You can have multiple strategies to meet a stated objective. If you have multiple objectives, you will need to outline strategies to meet each objective.

Analyze Existing Data Sources of Data: Census Data Analyzing the existing data will help you begin to understand the local need, the location and impact of existing programs and service gaps. Additionally, it is helpful to have national or state level information to set context for your research. By comparing the level of need to existing program interventions you will get a good picture of what is going on in your local community and be able to begin pinpointing the gaps in service. Be sure to define Geographic and Population scope as well as issue area / need. Sources of Data: Census Data Feeding America – Hunger in America Report Feeding Texas – SNAP Shot & Texas Hunger Atlas Texas Hunger Imitative Food Research & Action Center (FRAC) Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Center for Disease Control

Conduct Your Own Research Identify Community Stakeholders and determine what data collection method(s) you are going to use to obtain information from identified stakeholders. Method When to Use Things to Consider Focus Group When you need to solicit opinions, gather feedback and identify social norms on a topic from multiple people with similar characteristics (clients, service providers, teachers). Focus groups allow you to gather descriptive data quickly. The logistics of organizing focus groups and transcription can be time consuming and expensive. Focus groups are very helpful for descriptive data, but they do not provide quantitative data, as the groups are not big enough samples. In-Depth Interviews Interviews allow you to obtain detailed insider information that people might not share in a group setting. It takes a lot of time to conduct interviews and they provide you with a limited amount of opinions on a topic. Survey When you need to gather responses from a large sample of people. Surveys allow you to easily compare responses. Surveys don’t capture spontaneous conversation. If questions are not designed appropriately you may not capture the right information, making your data misleading. Community Stakeholders - Stakeholders are community leaders, individuals running community-based organizations and the people who will ultimately be impacted by the outcomes of your work: Community Organizations Community Members Community Safety Nets Government Officials Local Taskforces

Conduct your Own Research Cont. Quantitative vs. Qualitative Research Qualitative research explores attitudes, behavior and experiences through such methods as interviews or focus groups. It attempts to get an in-depth opinion from participants. Quantitative research generates statistics using methods such as surveys or structured interviews. The research needs to collect information from a large and representative sample. Vs.

Translating Data into Recommendations Review the findings from your data analysis-what does the hard data tell us? Where is the need? Where are the gaps? Review the findings from the data you collected-review quantitative and qualitative research (surveys, focus groups, interviews) to identify both themes and points of contention. How does this inform the hard data you analyzed? Build the context of the issue by highlighting gaps that depict the situation realistically, using real stories to support facts can be powerful. Talk with internal stakeholders and other decision makers at the food bank. Take time to discuss the opportunities and limitations (internal and external) and use these conversations to prioritize and shape your recommendations. Get stakeholder input. This helps to make sure your recommendations have some level of support from a broad spectrum of community members.

Other Resources Data Set / Research Studies List up front. Community Toolbox from Kansas University - The Kansas University Community Tool Box provides resources on conducting a community assessment. Online resource for those working to build healthier communities and bring about social change. It offers thousands of pages of tips and tools for taking action in communities. Policy Map / Other GIS Software