Needs and readiness assessments: Tools for promoting community-university engagement with Aboriginal communities

Fay Fletcher,Fiona Robertson,Jodie Asselin,Alicia Hibbert

doi:10.5130/ijcre.v6i1.3219

Abstract

Community-based participatory research (CBPR) is an important means of connecting the perspectives of community members with critical social issues, such as health and wellness. As beneficial as CBPR can be, effective engagement with community members remains a difficult goal to achieve. In this article, we draw on the international literature around needs and readiness assessments to explore their potential for establishing solid foundations for engaged research. We examine the stages and dimensions identified in the literature, and use these as a framework for a needs and readiness assessment project undertaken with a Métis Settlement community in Alberta, Canada. We share how the needs and readiness assessments helped to foster the emergence of community priorities, informing the next steps in research design, program content and evaluation methods, and heightening community-university engagement. It is our hope that our example of engagement, which focuses on the role of needs and readiness assessments in strengthening community-university partnerships, will better inform engagement approaches so that they become relevant, culturally appropriate and community specific.  Keywords: Métis, Aboriginal, community-based participatory research, needs assessment, readiness assessment, community-university partnership

Highlights

TO THE RESEARCH Buffalo Lake Métis Settlement, located 180 km from the nearest major city, shares a history of colonisation and marginalisation with other Aboriginal communities in Canada, experiencing disproportionate rates of social, health and economic burdens compared to the non-Aboriginal population in Canada (Martens et al 2011).The Métis are one of the three constitutionally recognised Aboriginal groups in Canada (McNab 2005)
A community readiness assessment is aligned with Community-based participatory research (CBPR) principles that promote building on existing strengths and resources within the community (Israel et al 1998); for the readiness assessment at Buffalo Lake Métis Settlement, community assets were preidentified by a small number of community members, further expanded and ranked in participatory focus group activities with a larger number of participants
While the diversity among First Nations peoples in Canada can be compared to the diversity among Native Americans in the United States, there is no such comparison for Métis people’s unique history and culture

Summary

Introduction

The Métis are one of the three constitutionally recognised Aboriginal groups in Canada (McNab 2005). The Métis are overlooked within Aboriginal health research and addressed primarily within pan-Aboriginal studies (Driben 1985; Findlay 2011; Lamouche 2002; Martens et al 2011; Tjepkema et al 2011; Younge 2003). As of 2006, the Aboriginal population in Canada was 1 172 790, representing 3.7 per cent of the total population; of that total, the Métis number 389 785, and are the fastest growing Aboriginal group in Canada (Gionet 2009). Despite comprising one-third of Canada’s Aboriginal peoples, the health disparities between the Métis and other Canadians remain unaddressed (Martens et al 2011).

Objectives

Methods

Results

Conclusion