To Prepare

Select an issue relevant to your professional interests that you believe would benefit from a needs assessment. Consider how you might go about implementing a needs assessment for this issue. Use the following questions to guide your thinking:

• Why do you believe a needs assessment is necessary?
• What is the target population you hope to gather data about?
• Are there existing data sources that you can use?
• Do you need to collect new data? If so, what methods will you use to collect it?

By Day 3

Post a description of the issue you selected. Explain how a needs assessment would benefit this issue and contribute to social change. Then explain the preliminary steps you might take to implement a needs assessment in this area. Include the type of sampling you would use to find key stakeholders and why this type of sampling is appropriate.