Joanne Standlee posted:Hi
Sounds like a wonderful program!
My first question is did you do a survey before marketing the program to find what the local community wanted/needed? Second question, did you market it as a resilience program? I ask because if it doesn't feel relevant then attendance will probably stay low and terms like resilience are not very engaging for people who are struggling to get by. It sound like you might need to help connect what you're offering to the needs of the community.
I would identify key concerns, child behavior, feeling stressed, anxiety, difficulty sleeping, loneliness, basically the outcome of living in a low resource neighborhood with environmental ACEs that impact everyone. Then I'd contextualize the program as helping with those things, BUT it has to be what they see as challenges, not our assessment of those challenges.
Of course incentives always help, but if you don't have the budget for something tangible you could do something like earn a certificate of completion if you attend x number of sessions.
Best of luck with your work!
Thank you! A needs assessment using data and information from another countywide program was used during the planning process. We are looking at changing the wording with less stress on terms like "resiliency". You make great points and I am going to share this with the advisory board.