Measuring the Moving Target:
Materials to Help You Find Out What Your Target Groups Want
Download these free resources from The Wallace Foundation on market research for non-profit youth service providers (and others). Go to the Knowledge Center at www.wallacefoundation.org/KnowledgeCenter – then click on “Out-of-School Time Learning.” In Wallace’s work with non-profit youth-serving organizations across the U.S., many organization leaders asked for help doing market research on the preferences and needs of the young people and their parents they seek to serve. Wallace supported the development of research-based tools now used by many non-profits to identify the topics they need to address to attract and serve their target groups – including safety, transportation, hours of service, program focus, development opportunities, price, and staffing. Find out what your target groups want by asking them, with these straightforward, adaptable tools and workbooks.
Getting Started with Market Research for Out-of-School Time Planning: A Resource Guide for Communities
Conducting market research for out-of-school-time planning can replace assumptions with facts, give kids and parents a voice to express their needs and preferences, and help build stakeholder buy-in and support. This practical guide shows out-of-school-time practitioners and community leaders how to use market research to make more informed decisions. It includes a how-to-do-it overview of market research as well as a series of workbooks that explain in detail how to conduct a variety of research activities.
Author: Julianne Pokela, Ph.D., et al., Market Street Research
All Work and No Play? Listening to What Kids and Parents Really Want from Out-of-School Time
This national survey from Public Agenda reports on what children and their parents want from out-of-school programs, adding their often-missing voices to the out-of-school-time policy debate. The report concludes that the vast majority of families want such programs, but they differ — particularly along racial and socioeconomic lines — in what they expect and how satisfied they are with what’s available. The data can help providers develop programs with an understanding of the needs of the young people they seek to attract and serve.
Authors: Ann Duffet and Jean Johnson with Steve Farkas, Susanna Kung and Amber Ott, Public Agenda