Community needs assessment

A field guide for social work students

Studying in BASW

What is community need assessment?

 A field work to identify the assets of a community and determine potential concern that it
faces.
 A straightforward way to estimate the needs of a community by asking community
residents on opinions about the development of services within the community, their
satisfaction with services, and what particular services are needed.
 Is a way of building an agenda aimed at community change that can build the capacity of
community based organizations that are designed to provide services and development
opportunities?
How to conduct assessment?
The assessment phase consists of following phases

1. The planning and organizing phase.

It includes-
a. Information gathering
b. Learn about the organizations and the program that is being assessed.
c. Identify goals and objectives for the need assessment

2. Need assessment methodology

It includes-
a. Getting ready

 Identify the participants whom you want to survey

 Identify your strategies for need assessment
 Identify the methods for collecting information-
- This will include: focus group, survey, and information collected at
public forums
For example door to door survey can be good example for need assessment
 Identify how the information can be analyzed
 Identify how the information be summarized and present a final report.
Consider the followings for collecting information
a. Define your population you are targeting. Focus on the group you target (e.g community
residents, business owners, self-help groups, teachers within certain school, health posts, or
all the people within certain geographic boundries.)
b. The current resources within the community should also be acknowledge.
The needs assessment should not just focus on the concerns of weakness of the community
but should also recognize the strengths and existing resources of a community.

3. Developing a needs assessment strategies

The tools for collecting information during need based assessment are
 Focus group discussion
 Creating a need assessment survey
 Community public forum
 Observation
 Interviews
Focus group discussion (FGD)
 It consists of people who share a common situation to some degree. For instance, you may want
to organize a focus group in which the participants are similar to each other( e.g- youth to youth,
aama samuha, buhari samuha, class ten students, etc)
 Its main motto is to allow a free flow of exchange of ideas and opinions
 It is requested to hold a few focus groups; one with community leaders, this includes local
politicians, business owners, club leaders, community activists, organizations leaders etc.

How to prepare for focus groups

 Prepare an invitation list for each group, including their name, phone number, and
address. There should be no more than 8-10 people for each group
 Set up a date, time ( usually 2 hours) and location for the focus group
 Call each potential participants and personally request him/her to attend the focus
group
 Choose your facilitator, this person will lead the discussion. It is good to choose
someone from the partnership who can be regarded as an ‘ outsider’ so that the
participants don’t feel threatened by an agency presence( e.g university partner)
 Arrange for someone who can take notes and be in charge of audio taping or data
collection during discussion.
 Make food arrangements for the focus group sessions.
 Send out an invitation letter (flier) to each invitee along with a brief explanation of the
purpose of focus group and need assessment
 Reminder phone calls need to be made the evening prior to the focus group
 When focus group members arrive, have them sign in and put a name tag on.
 Allow 15 minutes for participants to introduce themselves and mingle

Once the focus group participants have settled down……..

 Introduce yourself as the facilitator
 Have the participants introduce yourself
 Briefly describe the needs assessment process, why it’s being done, and the role of focus group.
 Also let them know the recording of discussion
 If anyone has problem with your recording, they should let you know right away.
Answer any questions from participants

Writing the final report

An overall report of need based assessment findings is necessary in order to provide written proof
that an assessment was carried out and the report can serve to answer any questions regarding the
process or findings if the needs assessment.

A. Report outline/ division of chapters

1. Abstract
This is a short version of the overall report that includes the purpose of the needs
assessment; a very brief description of what each phase involved, the result, and
the conclusions
2. Chronology of events
From the beginning of meetings to the development of the final report
3. Description of study
This page details the purpose and steps involved
4. Participants profile.
This page includes graphs and tables describing the socio- demographic
information of samples you surveyed (e.g. –gender, ethnicity, level of education,
age, number of years living in the community.
5. Brief report
list the top 5- 10 concerns and strength identified by residents in the survey
6. Open ended survey responses
If any qualitative responses were included in the survey, you can include a sample
of responses on this page
7. Community forum discussion
This is a summary of issues discussed at the public forums. This section can be
divided into the separate issues discussed.
For example-
A. Issue- community safety
B. Dimensions of issue- what participants had to say about the issue
C. Suggestion for action- participants suggestions on how to realistically deal
with the issue
8. Recommendation
This page include feasible and realistic recommendations that require major
programmatic changes.
9. Appendices

Public forum

The public forum, unlike the focus group is open to anyone who is interested in attending.
The purpose of public forum is-
a. Discuss the major issues brought forth by the respondents in needs assessment survey
b. Provide public forum participants the opportunity to discuss possible solutions to the
issue of concern

Planning the public forum

 Find a location, such as public library or school’s ground that is accessible

and centrally located in the community
 Reserve the location for at least 2 hours
 Prepare a public forum information to be distributed during data collection
 Try to contact as many people as possible via telephone, speech especially to
those who are participated in the focus group or in the data collection

Resources needed for public forum

 A summary sheet for the participants outlining the major issues brought up in the
survey
 Overhead projector, markers, chart paper, color, pen, pencils etc
 Copies of questionnaires for survey
 Name tags and sign in sheet
 Poster paper and markers to record suggestions made by participants
 refreshment
 Identifying priority problems worksheet

Based on the analysis of behavioral data, community opinion data, public forum, focus group, and other
pertinent information, the students from Texas International College, BSW first year has identified the
…………………Community’s priority problem

Rank Problem
#1

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