The assessments provide information on needs and assets as well as competing priorities.  Below is an annotated list of assessments used by many other sectors interested in the environment and their community.  Check out the guidelines and types of questions that are asked.  One important tip is to gather all the previous community assessments done in your area so that you can take advantage of completed work and build on the knowledge base.  A quick Internet search or call may lead to some interesting results. Your own assessment will help to create well-grounded relationships, programs and successes. If your local health, EJ and grassroots have yet to do an assessment, this would be a great collaborative project.

The Educational Field 

Putting the Pieces Together: Comprehensive School-Linked Strategies for Children and Families is the result of a collaborative partnership among the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Office of Educational Research and Improvement in the U.S. Department of Education, and the Regional Educational Laboratory Network. The guidebook includes numerous brief examples from programs in schools and communities throughout America where diverse stakeholders have come together to create a system that enables children to come to school ready to learn every day.
A community assessment is an exercise by which a collaborative partnership gathers information on the current strengths, concerns, and conditions of children, families, and the community. The information comes from many sources--especially parents and family members--and is elicited by many techniques, including interviews, focus groups, and scanning demographic data collected by local agencies. Because many types of partners participate in a community assessment--strategic planners, program staff, administrators, teachers, parents, and other community members--the resulting information is broad, accurate, and useful.
In Putting the Pieces Together the following questions are addressed:
• What Does a Community Assessment Involve?
• How Does a Partnership Conduct a Community Scan?
• How Can a Community Assessment Engage Families and Community Members?
• What Factors Are Involved in Understanding Community Assets?
• How Should Assessment Information Be Used and By Whom?
• How Can a Partnership Use Assessment Results to Move from Planning to Action?
• Learning Opportunities

The Environmental Health Field

Through a multi-year partnership with the National Center for Environmental Health (NCEH) of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO), provides technical assistance to local health departments and their constituents in conducting community-based environmental health assessments.  NACCHO developed the Protocol for Assessing Community Excellence in Environmental Health (PACE EH), a methodology to guide local communities in identifying and addressing environmental health priorities.

The process is designed to improve decision-making by taking a collaborative community-based approach. The methodology takes the user through a series of steps to engage the public, collect necessary and relevant information pertaining to community environmental health concerns, rank issues, and set local priorities for action. At the heart are three core processes: developing new relationships with community stakeholders, expanding understanding about the relationship between human health and the state of the environment, and redefining a leadership role for public health officials in environmental health. A free  download of this information is available in English and Spanish.

Community Service Clubs

Rotary International is the world's first service club organization. Its more than 1.2 million members volunteer their time and talent to further the Rotary motto, Service Above Self. Rotary clubs make a difference locally and internationally through service. It recommends that clubs first learn about local issues to discover opportunities for service projects and avoid duplicating existing resources. Community assessments such as surveys, asset inventories, and focus groups are tools used in the process.

Environmental Justice

The Environmental Justice Geographic Assessment Tool on EPA’s website provides information relevant to assessing adverse health or environmental impacts, aggregate or cumulative impacts, unique exposure pathways, vulnerable or susceptible populations, or lack of capacity to participate in decision making processes among other conditions.