Continue to work on your community needs assessment plan. You will begin by re-visiting the top five strategies you prioritized in the Week 4 Discussion. The process of prioritizing strategies is iterative. As you work with your team and become more knowledgeable about the social problem, you may need to adjust your priorities.

Estimate how much time it would take to carry out the plan. Think about how long it will take to assemble and meet with your team, implement the strategies that you prioritized, and achieve the goals that you defined. In addition, be sure that your estimation accounts for any obstacles or delays that might occur. Finally, select a decision-making protocol that would use to reach consensus when meeting with the team. It is important to have a protocol in place ahead of time and to communicate the protocol to team members to avoid unnecessary confusion as decisions arise. It is also important to use a protocol that comfortable with.

To Prepare

Consider how long it would take to carry out the community needs assessment plan. Take into account how long it will take to assemble and meet with your team, implement the strategies you prioritized, achieve the goals that defined, and overcome any obstacles or delays that might occur.

Review the Learning Resources on decision-making protocols. Think about which protocol you would use with your team if you carried out the community needs assessment.

Refine the Problem Statement. Refine your problem statement, based on what you learned from your peers, your Instructor, and/or the Learning Resources this week and in previous weeks.

Develop a Team Strategy. Normally, after you have identified a project team, you would meet with the team and collaborate on the items listed below. In this case, since you are only planning the community needs assessment, you will address these items yourself rather than with a team.

Describe the top five strategies that you would prioritize to address the problem and prevent its recurrence. Explain your reasoning for prioritizing the strategies, including how the time and resources it would take to implement each influenced your decision making. Be sure to incorporate any feedback you received from your peers and/or your Instructor during the Week 4 Discussion, if applicable.

If you were to conduct this assessment, what is your estimation of the amount of time it would take to carry it out and why?

Describe the proposed decision-making protocol (e.g., majority vote, priority- based decision making) that you would use to reach a consensus among team members if you carried out the community needs assessment. Explain why you selected this protocol.