March 2010 Needs Assessment

The Stow Community Chest strives to understand the needs of our community to ensure that the agencies we fund are meeting those needs.  Our town’s demand and hopes for human services are also changing and growing, and we’d like to understand those, too. Approximately every five years, the Chest undertakes a formal community-wide assessment of needs seeking to involve all organizations and members in its evaluation.

Over the next few months, our Needs Assessment Committee will be hosting various focus groups. The data from your responses to our survey, as well as that from relevant agencies and organizations, will inform the committee and hugely benefit our final evaluation. The focus group meetings will include representatives from town government, the schools, churches, various community organizations, public agencies, emergency assistance, and professional support services. 

In the last Needs Assessment project, participants identified needs affecting several segments of our community.  Some of the results of this project include: 

• Providing seed money to help support the creation of Warm Hearts of Stow
• Continuing to support the Boys & Girls Club and Big Brother/Big Sister in their efforts to provide services to Stow youth
• Continuing to maintain the “Stow Community Chest Guide to Human Services” to help address the need for information and referral assistance which was found to be present across all areas of our community.  This guide is mailed to each household in Stow annually and is now included in the Stow School Directory.
• Providing support to the Domestic Violence Victims Assistance Program (DVVAP) as well as the Network for Women’s Lives in response to growing needs.

 All of this is in addition to the continued support of such community organizations as the Stow Food Pantry, Warm Hearts of Stow, the Stow Council on Aging, the Stow Bloodmobile, and many others. 

If you or someone you know is aware of a need in the Stow community that is not being served, please contact the Needs Assessment Committee at needs@stowcommunitychest.org.  If you would like to complete our questionnaire regarding needs in our community, please print out the online survey and mail it to Stow Community Chest, P.O. Box 392, Stow MA 01775   Attn: Needs Assessment. 

We appreciate your help as we continue to support those agencies providing vital services for our town's residents, and make sense of new and future needs in Stow.  If you would like further information, please contact us via email at needs@stowcommunitychest.org. 

Thank you for your support! 

Skye Gibson

SCC Needs Committee Co-Chair