Obtaining participant input is the 3rd step in the program development cycle. Doing a needs assessment is important for program and event planners because if we understand what the participants want to do the program will be more likely to succeed and participants will be more satisfied. There are several way to conduct a needs assessment- citizen advisory committees, public meetings and workshops, focus groups, and survey. The most popular are focus groups and surveys.
There is quite a bit of preparation that goes into running a focus group. It must be a planned discussion, in which questions are designed to discover participants opinions on certain points of interests. A focus group needs a meeting agenda that includes the following things: a problem statement, opening narrative, greeting, ground rules, ice breakers, focus of the topic, discussion questions, 3 probes per question, and a conclusion. There should typically be about 5-7 questions, and sentences should begin with “explain to me” or “describe to me.” By beginning sentences like this, we are able to get a clearer understanding of what the participant means, instead of a yes/no answer. A focus group meeting should last approximately 30 min and should have at least 3 people attend. The participants responses should be written down so you can analyze the data afterwards. You can see what responses were similar from the participants, and which ideas were viewed negatively. From this you can decide what activities you would like to facilitate. Needs assessments work because participants feel comfortable in sharing their opinions and facilitators are able to gage the intensity of someone’s opinion. You are able to gain more information about what the participant wants out of the program, and they may give you ideas that you had not thought of before.
I recently helped plan and facilitate a focus group for a class project with CQ and BB. We did our program with the After School program that we currently work for. We had 4 kids attend this meeting and a site supervisor. We made sure that we asked kids from each age group to attend so that we would have a good representation of what the whole program would like to do. We asked kids questions like, “what is your favorite part of the program” “what music do you like” “what activities outside would you be interested in” and “what are your favorite foods.” From the focus group my group did, we found that the kids favorite part of the program was snack time and that they really enjoyed going outside. We incorporated these 2 things into our event by decorating cookies, and playing the majority of our activities outside.
If you want to have a successful event/program and satisfied participants it is crucial that you find out what your participants are interested in. I have found that focus groups are an effective and easy way to get feedback from people. Let us know how you feel about focus groups and any helpful hints!
-AC
3 Rec Girls 