Dear Jean, Thanks very much for your question to the Community Tool Box on defining sustainability earlier this month. While I'm not sure there's one official answer, here's one way of looking at it: What makes for sustainability? You are right that funding is important. But beyond that, what seems essential is having some kind of organizational structure that will serve as a framework for keeping the intervention going. That structure could be some kind of formal, or possibly informal, organization. It would probably have defined operating procedures. It might well have some mechanism for dividing up its work, publicizing its work, and recruiting new members to keep the energy alive. For example, I would guess that the asthma work you do in Idaho would be less sustainable without the organizational structure of the Idaho Division of Health. The sustaining structure for other interventions need not be as formal, and certainly need not be a government agency, but some kind of strcture that is best suited to the particular intervention will generally be an asset. As for resources addressing the issue, at the risk of promoting our own work, I'll mention a recent book written by my colleague Tom Wolff and me, The Spirit of the Coalition, published by the American Public Health Association (Washington DC) in 2000. This contains a chapter toward the end on sustainability issues. Hope this may help a bit. Thank you again for being in touch with us, and all best wishes for continued success in your own work. Sincerely, Bill Berkowitz, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Psychology University of Massachusetts Lowell Lowell, MA 01854 For the Community Tool Box Team
You may want to contact the RWJ Foundation directly about this one. If they pointed you this way, they may have meant that you could find some helpful tools in the Community Tool Box. They might have an advocacy toolkit that they already created. However, there are several toolkits on the Community Tool Box that you might find helpful. You can find them at: http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/corecompetencies.jsp
You may want to check out the review of programs at the Guide to Community Preventive Services, http://www.thecommunityguide.org/. They have done a wonderful job of reviewing the experimental and practice literature in public health. Their reviews of physical activity and nutrition are very helpful.
Great question. I don't know of an award program for communities yet, although several are named as "Healthy Community" awards. These still focus on honoring individual contributions rather than group contributions. I'll keep looking and will post another answer if I find one!
You might want to contact your state's mental health agency for guidelines and requirements for starting this kind of group home, but you can find information on grant writing on the Community Tool Box. Check out the Toolkit on grant writing at http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/writegrantapplication/index.jsp. Or you could find additional help in Part L of the Table of Contents at http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/tools_toc.htm. Good luck!
What a great thing to be considering. I believe that this will be difficult, depending on local politics and cultural norms, although I wish this kind of thing were easy since it has the potential of helping a great many people. You might want to check out the Advocacy sections, and the Social Marketing sections of the CTB Table of Contents. Unfortunately, there is no "canned program" that will help. Good luck!
You may want to take a look at the Table of Contents from the Community Tool Box. There is a wealth of info there on these several topics. You can get to it directly from the home page, or from http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/tools_toc.htm.
You might want to check out two pages on the CTB for this information. You will find an example citation and instructions at: http://ctb.ku.edu/howtocredit.jsp. You can find out more about how to credit the CTB, and our printing and "right use" policy at: http://ctb.ku.edu/printing.jsp. Best of luck in your work.
You might want to check out the social marketing materials in the CTB Table of Contents (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/tools_toc.htm), or in the Toolkits(http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/corecompetencies.jsp). This material (like the rest of the CTB) was designed more for community mobilization efforts, but you might be able to adapt the materials for your context. Best of luck!
You might want to check out the problem analysis tools and the community assessment tools on the CTB (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/tools_toc.htm), although I suspect you were already there and were looking for other materials. You could try doing a search at the library, or a Google search which could yield additional information. Best of luck!
For funding your graduate degree, you might want to look to a local college financial aid office. Depending on where you are located, there might be a community foundation, or a local conversion foundation (created from the sale of a hospital). You might also want to try the state or local Chamber of Commerce for some assistance. They often help these kind of business start-ups.
I'm not sure that I have ever seen the materials you requested, but you might want to try three groups. Public Private Ventures has done some excellent reviews of mentoring programs and best practices (http://www.ppv.org/). You should also check out the WT Grant Foundation, which funds a lot of youth mentoring programs (http://www.wtgrantfoundation.org/). You might also want to check out the National Mentoring Partnership (http://www.mentoring.org/). Best of luck!
You might want to check out the resources at the CDC web site (http://www.cdc.gov/) for their curriculum materials and recommendations, as well as the Guide to Community Preventive Services (http://www.thecommunityguide.org). I don't think that the Community Guide staff have finished their recommendations for teen pregnancy prevention, but they might still have some relevant resources there. Best of luck!
Nothing beyond materials that relate to core competencies for community health promotion. For information on Environmental Health initiatives and efforts, you may want to check out the Centers for Disease Control (http://www.cdc.gov/, especially ASTDR which does the enviro health work now), and the Guide to Community Prventive Services (http://www.thecommunityguide.org) for their review of the science and best practices in the area. Best of luck!
Good question, but you might want to do a Yahoo or Google search on this one. We don't have much info on CDC's, other than to reference them in several sections as examples. Best of luck!
While there is a lot of mixed opinion on this issue, the involvement of people in the process of community is a basic American value. There are a couple of other resources that can provide some help with your question, however. One is the Association for the Study and Development of Community (http://www.capablecommunity.com/), and the other is AHEC/Community Partners (http://www.ahecpartners.com/). Both organizations take the value of local participation seriously, and have done research in this area.
A great place to start is with the Evaluation Toolkit on the Community Tool Box. You can find it on the home page, or directly at http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/evaluateinitiative/index.jsp. There are instructions, examples, links to other tools, and other things that will help you develop your evaluation questions, and choose methods most appropriate to your event.
You might want to try to contact your state's League of Municipalities for this information. A quick Google or Yahoo search will yield their web site and contact information. It is really great that you are working on this effort. Best of luck!
You might want to check out Part C of the Table of Contents for information on promoting interest in your initiative. Also, there is some really good advice and materials on social marketing in the Toolkits (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/implementsocialmarketing/index.jsp). Best of luck!
A lot depends on the kind of teen program you want to start. You can find a lot of resources in the CTB Table of Contents. Look under Part G, Implementing Community Interventions (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/part_G.htm). You can also find additional help on programs for prevention of health and behavioral problems among teens at the CDC and DASH web sites (http://www.cdc.gov/), and in the Guide to Community Preventive Services (http://www.thecommunityguide.org/). Best of luck!
While we don't have specific information about what information to ask or not ask, I'd recommend that you keep in mind the purpose of the volunteering and respect for the person you are interviewing. There are links to additional resources on recruiting volunteers in the CTB Table of Contents. Check out the section on Recruiting Volunteers (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/sub_section_main_1107.htm) for more info. Best of luck!
Most community development professionals point to the classic definition of community, which includes community as a place (geographic referent), a community of shared interest (union or social group), and/or a community of common experience (e.g., holocaust survivors). There is a lot of overlap in these three phrases, but you might find all three of them used when you hear people speaking of their community.
You will find two really great resources on community assessment in the Community Tool Box. One is in the Table of Contents (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/chapter_1003.htm), and the other is the Toolkit on Assessment (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/assesscommunity/index.jsp).
You might want to take a look at the Table of Contents and the chapter on assessing community needs and resources (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/chapter_1003.htm). Also, check out the Toolkit on community assessment (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/assesscommunity/index.jsp). Should those prove un-useful, I would recommend doing a web search, or contacting a local college or university social welfare department for some guidance on local resources in this area. Best of luck!
You might want to check out the section of the CTB Table of Contents that pertains to writing by-laws (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/section_1098.htm) for some assistance. If that proves to not be helpful, I would recommend contacting your local Chamber of Commerce, or doing a web search (Google or Yahoo) for some additional help. Best of luck!
There are a couple of resources on the CTB that may help you puzzle through a plan for getting resources. One is in the Table of Contents (see Chapter 42, http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/chapter_1042.htm). The other is in the Toolkits (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/writegrantapplication/index.jsp). While we don't offer any guarantees, you should also be looking to local foundations and the United Way, if your group is of particular social interest to your community. Best of luck!
Great project! You might want to take a look at the how-to information in Chapter 44, Section 2 of the Table of Contents (http://ctb.ku.edu/tools/en/section_1315.htm). It specifically has step by step instructions for establishing and maintaining this kind of program. Best of luck!
Yes, I would name the initiative, but it might depend on your purpose and how you relate to other things that are going on in the community. If you are organizing around something that is difficult to get people out for (e.g., fire safety), then you might want to partner with a local safe kids coalition, for example. In that case, your effort might be a committee within the broader effort, and the name might reflect that. Not naming the effort might result in people mis-understanding your purpose, and might make it even harder to organize around. I would refer you to the Toolkits on the CTB, especially the ones on social marketing and advocating for change. Best of luck!
Yes, they are available on the CTB. Unfortunately, she provided the incorrect URL. It was an old one that no longer is active. You can find the evaluation tools in Chapters 36-39 of the Table of Contents on the CTB. There is also an evaluation planning tool in the Toolkits. Best of luck.
You might begin by checking out Chapter 2 of the Community Tool Box, which contains sections on PRECEDE/PROCEED, as well as several other planning models. In addition, the sections in Chapter 8 offer some detailed guidance on strategic planning in general.
We agree, one step at a time sounds like a good way to go. But (if we read your question correctly), before you get too deeply into the baseline data you mention, you might want to take a step back and review the goals of your proposed evaluation study. What would you like to see happen as a result? What purposes will it serve? Our point is that an evaluation study should always follow from your intended goals ? i.e., the goals come first, the evaluation follows, in the service of those goals. Once your goals are clear, then your next steps will are also likely to become clearer. Those steps might well involve utilization and demographic data, as you suggest, but possibly not; or conceivably, other elements as well. One other main recommendation is to be sure that those who will be affected by the evaluation have a chance to shape it- both because they will have insights into the most relevant evaluation criteria (since they are likely to be closer to the scene), and also because they are more likely to accept and follow the results of the evaluation if they have had a hand in designing it. You may have already taken this point into account, and if so, excellent. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you, and that your study turns out to be productive for you and your organization. Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in your important work.
... Thank you for your question, Deb. We are circulating it among the members of the Community Tool Box staff, who occasionally are able to fulfill these types of requests. If that's the case here, someone will be in touch with you directly. Many best wishes with this, and for continued success with your important tobacco control work.
It's good that you are thinking about community assessment. And the short answer to your question is that there are probably (literally) thousands of assessment tools that have been used by other community projects, often quite effectively. But the fact that a particular assessment has worked well for another project does not mean that it is the best one for yours. That is because your own project will have unique qualities- and just as important, it will have a unique group of community members who will be affected by your work. What this suggests is that you should design your assessment with those community members in mind. More specifically, we recommend you let them work with you, and help you, both in designing your particular assessment and ideally in carrying it out as well. If that is done, your assessment is more likely to be sensitive to the real needs of your particular community; and in addition, the community members are more likely to be guided by the results of that assessment, as contrasted with when the results are communicated downward by someone from outside. Two other points to keep in mind: (1) the fact that an issue is "relevant" for community members does not necessarily mean it is the best one to address at the moment; (and (2) in determining the best place to start, the assets of a community ought also to be taken into account, as well as the needs. You can find more information and elaboration of these points, and more specific recommendations, in Chapter 3, Section 7 of the Community Tool Box, which deals with needs assessment, and Chapter 3, Section 8, which deals with community assets. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in your important community work.
It's excellent that you are planning a community mapping project, one which we think can provide many benefits for Brunswick. In our opinion, there are no fixed rules for doing this type of work; we also feel it can be done without high costs and without expensive consultants. This is partly because Brunswick is relatively small in size (we have visited), and also because there's the potential to involve the Bowdoin community in what you are doing. It's a natural internship project for students, while some faculty may have database, mapping, or other community skills that they might provide. The key ingredients we feel are to have a core group of people who are willing to take on the work, a feasible work plan, and then (especially) some agreed-upon ideas for how the data will be used when collected, so that they will provide and keep on providing benefits to people in Brunswick. In other words, once you have completed your mapping, the Community for All Ages may really just be beginning. Some basic background and reading and background will help, though, and we would recommend among other sources the workbooks published by the Asset-Based Community Development Institute at Northwestern, especially A Guide to Capacity Inventories, A Guide to Mapping and Mobilizing the Associations in Local Neighborhoods, and perhaps those on faith communities, economic capacities, and business assets. These are low-cost guides, with details and order information at www.northwestern.edu/ipr/abcd/abcdworkbooks.html. Touring this site will also lead you to a sample on-line capacity inventory. You may also wish to consult Chapter 3, Section 8 of the Tool Box, on Identifying Community Assets. Then, get started! The rest is likely to fall into place. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in your important work.
It's excellent that you are starting such a team. The shape of your particular work, though, will depend upon the focus of your own particular advocacy and your own particular goals. In our opinion, that's the best place to start in developing a curriculum or program, since doing so is likely to serve you better than following someone else's model. There are some general principles of organizing for effective advocacy, however; we think your work will be enhanced by knowing and following them. Many of these principles are described in the Community Tool Box, specifically in Part I (Chapters 30-35), which contains about 50 different instructional sections on various advocacy topics and techniques. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in your important work.
The #1 thought here is to write your proposal to meet the needs of the school, and particularly the people at the school who will be reading what you have to say. So far, it seems that they have functioned without a development director. What added value can you then give to them? What specific benefits can you provide? And what, in their view, might be the possible downsides of their bringing you on? In other words, you always want to keep their point of view in mind ? to show them very clearly and specifically how you will improve the school and make their lives better, and also to counter any possible objections they might have. You have an advantage here, in that you presumably know the people involved. Who are they? What are they about? What is likely to persuade them (e.g., your track record?; your plans?; your knowledge of the school? your contacts?) and what might not? Be guided accordingly. You may also wish to consult Chapter 42, Section 4 of the Tool Box for some more general elaboration on these points, and Chapter 42, Section 5, on the mechanics of writing a grant. We hope these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box, and all best wishes for success in your important work.
Thank you for writing to us with your question. Here are some thoughts for your consideration: Your time is limited, which is very understandable. So it will help you to get as much help as you can from other sources. Where should that help come from? Most logically, from the people who will be served by the new clinic itself. So can you assemble a group of leaders from that new community to come and meet with you? Or can some leaders assemble other leaders? Then in a meeting, you can ask them what kinds of services they would like to see in their community. That will help your services become more responsive, and will also increase local buy-in. Then, to verify their ideas, could they help you design a survey for broader distribution in that area? You could help revise it, as needed -- or, alternatively, you could draft, and they could revise. A well-done survey can also serve the purpose of asking for volunteers, resources, other things you might need. You can accomplish many goals at the same time. This is the principle of social leverage, here well applied. For further information, you might benefit from consulting Chapters 18 and 19 of the Tool Box, on designing and starting interventions. Thank you again for contacting us, and all best wishes for a wonderful new clinic and for success in your community work.
Congratulations on organizing this event, which we hope will not only benefit your school, but will be enjoyable for you and everyone as well. Events like this can also significantly boost people?s sense of community. In most communities ? and most likely in your own ? there should be a variety of organizations willing to sponsor and help in other ways, for making a modest one-time dollar contribution to local children?s education is usually an appealing and affordable cause. Therefore, it should help to obtain as complete a list as possible of your local organizations, either through an existing organization, your local public library, or a local web site, and if necessary the yellow pages of your local phone directory. For businesses, you could start with your local Chamber of Commerce. Go through your lists carefully with members of your organizing committee, and target those you feel would be your most likely supporters. Then, especially since time is short in your case, make personal contact with them to the best extent possible. In our opinion, $1 per child may be a very modest amount to contribute. To increase your revenue, you could consider such features as a 2-for-1 match, ?super-sponsorship? at a higher level, donations of Grand Prizes (possibly by lottery), or underwriting of the read-a-thon through mention in your publicity or written program. Over and above this, you might think of some ways to maximize the festivity of the event, so that many community members will come together, have a chance to mingle and network with each other, build a stronger constituency for children?s education, and perhaps indirectly generate new education or community activities as well. You may also wish to consult Chapter 3, Section 8 of the Tool Box for some more general information on Identifying Community Assets. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. We hope you have a great day ahead! Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in your important work.
When forming a coalition, the best candidates for membership are usually those groups or individuals who are most affected by the driving issue at hand. For an antismoking coalition, this would be those people and groups who are most affected by smoking. What would this mean specifically? Typically, such a coalition would include the public health agency in your town and/or county; other local agencies that do health outreach; the local chapter of the American Cancer Society; leaders of anti-smoking or cancer support groups; and representatives from different school levels (both elementary, middle, and high school, and including both teachers and students). Another perhaps less obvious possibility could be representatives from local convenience stores (where cigarettes are often purchased) since an active member from this constituency can often effectively influence other convenience store owners. You could also open your coalition to citizens who do not have a formal agency affiliation, but who may have time, interest, or skills that can benefit you. Each community is unique, and there may be other excellent candidates in your own community setting. So if there are others organizing the coalition together with you, it might be a good idea to meet together with them, make a list of most likely candidates where you are located, and plan the most effective way to make contact with them to ask them to join. You may also wish to consult Chapter 5, Section 5 and 6 of the Tool Box for some more general information on Coalition Building. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. We hope that your coalition will provide valuable services in your community! Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in your important work.
Excellent question. And in response, a key point is that statistical validity is a continuum, rather than a yes-no matter. There are degrees of validity; you want to make your survey as valid as possible, within the resources you have available. A second key point is that your sample should most accurately represent the population or group you wish to generalize to. What group would that be in your case? In other words, if you would like to generalize your findings to the entire community, then your sample should be drawn from that entire community, here of 50,000 people. If, however, you want your sample to be representative of (and generalize to) a smaller unit, then your sample should be drawn from that smaller population. In your situation, if you are interviewing 50 people, a commonly accepted procedure is to draw a random sample of 50 from all the members in your population ? which could be your entire community, or possibly a smaller group. (A random sample means that each member of the population has an equal chance of being included in the sample.) You would then need to obtain, or approximate, a list of all the members of your population. If your intended population is the full community, this could involve a town census list (if that is available), or a random selection of housing units. If your intended population is smaller, your task may be somewhat easier. Most good social science research methods textbooks will provide further details on survey mechanics. You may also wish to consult Chapter 3, Sections 12 and 13 of the Tool Box for some more general information on conducting interviews and surveys. If, though, a truly random sample is for some reason not possible, then you should normally make your best possible approximation to it, while being aware that this will usually diminish the statistical validity or representativeness of your findings. One more suggestion is to review your starting assumption that you have resources to interview only 50 people. Can this number be expanded? You might expand it either through obtaining additional resources, or through the use of volunteer trained interviewers, or using a smaller number of questions, or through group interviews, or an e-mailed or Web survey, or through staggering the survey dates, or through other efficiencies? On further consideration, it may be possible to include more than 50 people in your sample after all. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you, and hope your survey proves to be very successful. Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in your important work.
Thank you for writing to us. As you may have seen, the Community Tool Box is designed to provide practical information on many different areas within the very broad field of community health. By reviewing the Table of Contents, you?ll find dozens of specific how-to-do-it sections on a wide variety of topics. We think that the best use of this site for your students will depend upon your particular students and your particular teaching goals. So one way to proceed would be to review the Table of Contents, examine some of the most promising sections within it, and pick out those you feel would have the most value for the students you are teaching. Then you could have your students read those sections, and perhaps answer questions to them that you design. Or they could make up their own questions. Or they could provide a section critique. (We welcome feedback of any kind.) The same would also apply to the many Toolkits and Best Practices modules found in other areas of the Tool Box web site. In addition, as a different option, your students could use a particular Tool Box section, Toolkit, or Best Practice outline as a basis for creating some new material in that general area, such as an illustrative example, a case study, or new instructional content. In that way, your students could be creators as well as consumers of knowledge. Of course, we would be interested in knowing about that should it occur. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you again for writing, and all best wishes for success in your important work.
This is an important question, but a hard one to answer briefly, because ?strengths and talents? take in a lot of territory! There are literally thousands of assessment tools that have been used for this general purpose, many of which have been designed to assess very specific strengths and talents, of many different descriptions. So an accurate general answer would be ?It depends on what particular strengths and talents you want to measure.? Once you are as clear on this as possible, then your search should become easier. However, we will mention two examples, which may help get you started. In the community development field, there are a number of tools called capacity inventories; these assess an individual?s skills and interests in participating in local community life. One downloadable example of this can be found at www.northwestern.edu/ipr/abcd/abcdi.html. Another quite different type of tool is one that the psychologist Martin Seligman has used to measure what he calls an individual?s ?signature strengths.? You can learn more by visiting his web site at www.authentichappiness.org. You may also wish to consult Chapter 3, Section 8 of the Community Tool Box for some more general information on Identifying Community Assets. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you. Thank you for writing to us, and all best wishes for success in your important work.
Thank you for writing to us with your important question. It seems that your goal is to get landlords to show up at your meeting. So a good question to ask is ?Why should they do so?? Or, suppose you were a landlord yourself: what would it take to get you to come? We think part of the answer is that there has to be some benefit for the landlord for coming, or at least some perceived benefit. What might that benefit be? It could be saving money, since you mention a loan program. It could be compliance with the law. It could be doing the right thing for one?s tenants. It could be fear of penalty if one does not take part. It could be group pressure from other landlords who will be attending. Any or all of these are possible reasons for coming. State your best reasons clearly, forcefully, and respectfully in your communications. And if you do know other landlords who will definitely be coming, perhaps they might be able to help you persuade other landlords they know. In your case, some landlords may hesitate to come because they think it will cost them money, or because they think no one will bother them if they do not come, do not think it will be worth their time. In your letter, in your press release, and in other communications, you will want to find ways to counter those possible objections, and persuade them that the benefits of attending are very much greater then the possible costs of not being there. You may also wish to consult Chapter 6, Section 2 of the Community Tool Box for some more general information on Principles of Persuasion, as well as Chapter 6, Chapter 3 on Preparing Press Releases, and Chapter 33, Sections 1 and 2 on writing letters. We hope some of these thoughts may be helpful to you, and hope that your meeting will bring good results for everyone. Thanks again for writing to us, and all best wishes for success in your important work.
One useful definition of advocacy is the use of persuasion directed toward decision makers, in order to convince them to take action that benefits you or the people you represent. Advocacy can be used by many different individuals or groups. It often occurs in the legal system, in economic discussions, in community settings, and certainly in politics. The particular goals may be different, but the basic principles of advocacy are frequently the same. The Community Tool Box contains a great deal of material about advocacy. You can learn more about it by reviewing the Table of Contents, and then consulting many of the Tool Box sections in Part I, Chapters 30-35. Thank you for writing to us, and all best wishes for success in your community work.
Thank you for providing an interesting question to consider. It is not used as a phrase too much in the US, but in England and other places where the phrase is more commonly used, it relates to a focal point for community services. These could be triage and case management services, such as an access point for multiple agencies providing public assistance. They could also be day-care providers or other direct service providers that use a common community office. In some communities in the US, libraries and coffee shops can serve this role. We hope that this is a helpful answer, and wish you the best in your efforts to improve community services.
That you are asking this question reveals that you are already very thoughtful about community involvement in decision-making. Building from that value, there are several sections within the CTB Table of Contents you might want to consider as guides: - Ch 3, Section 3. Conducting Public Forums and Listening Sessions - Ch 3, Section 6. Conducting Focus Groups - Ch 3, Section 17. Leading a Community Dialogue on Building a Healthy Community There are other resources on the CTB, but these should get you moving forward in the right direction. We wish you the best in all your work.
This is a great question, but I'm afraid that there are not easy answers for you. The best answer I can provide is: "It depends!" There are several issues related to sample size that must be taken into consideration. One is the size of the interview/questionaire, another is response rate, another is what level of change you wish to detect, another is to what extent do you want to generalize the findings to a broader population, and another is how you will use the data. You will need to contact a local epidemiologist or biostatistician for the best help. Some may charge for this service, but many universities have consulting groups that can be very cost effective in this area. We wish you the best in your efforts.
Thank you for your important question. You can learn more about logic models by consulting Chapter 2, Section 1 of the Community Tool Box, "Developing a Logic Model or Theory of Change." (This can be accessed by clicking ?Tools? on our home page, and then ?Table of Contents.?) You may also wish to consult several of the other sections in Chapters 1 and 2 on different types of models, perhaps especially Chapter 1, Section 5, which discusses an evaluation model we use ourselves. We believe that logic models are valuable; at the same time, they are not cast in stone, so it may be perfectly acceptable to adapt the details of the model to meet the needs and demands of your particular situation. Ultimately, your colleagues and participants in the healthy children's program will need both to support and to help implement the model if it is to be successful. Thank you again for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success in developing a network of children's centers whose success will exceed even your own expectations.
Dear Asira: Thank you for writing to us with your question. There are many places to learn about evaluation and evaluation models. Our own site, the Community Tool Box, might be helpful to you. There are plenty of materials on the site that you could review. Specifically, you could begin by looking at Chapter 36, Section 1 of the Tool Box, which is called ?A Framework for Program Evaluation?; this should give you a very good overview. Then you could look at the many other sections we have posted on Evaluation in Chapters 36, 38, and 39, about 15 in all. You can find these by clicking the ?Tools? menu tab on our home page, then ?Table of Contents.? Finally, you could also look at our Toolkits, including one on evaluation, which you can find by clicking the ?About the CTB? menu tab on our home page. All this should keep you busy for a while! If you are looking for more sites, one general site among many you could check is at www.wmich.edu/evalctr/checklists, which will lead you to summaries and checklists for a variety of evaluation approaches. In one sentence, though, we think the best way to evaluate any program is to carefully define its goals, to establish clear and measurable criteria for success, and then to evaluate based upon those criteria. Thank you for writing to us at the Community Tool Box; and all best wishes for success both in your training and in your career to follow.
Thank you for writing to us with your important question. While we do not have any specific information on the Community Tool Box about involving teens in the community, many of the materials present can be adapted for use with teens. Your first step might be for your communities to build their own capacity to work with (or involve) teens. Second, you might consider involving the teens in adapting some of the CTB materials to build their own capacity. This sounds like a lot of work, but it you work a little at a time; you might be surprised how quickly it moves, although this process could take a few years to implement within a community. An important thing to note is that while many organizations involve teens by creating a new place at the table, unless the adults? capacity to involve the teens increases, and you build enough capacity among youth to also engage the group authentically, not much will happen. We wish you the best in your work and look forward to hearing good things about your success.