The Search Institute

Lake Cities Focus is partnering with the Search Institute® to help determine the needs of community students.

The Search Institute® is a national nonprofit organization that has conducted decades of research on how students are affected by Developmental Assets and Developmental Relationships®. In summary, the more Developmental Assets and Developmental Relationships® students have, the more likely they will be successful in school and in life. Developmental Relationships® (healthy, mentor-like relationships with adults) help students cultivate Developmental Assets (positive internal character traits and external supports).

Cultivating intentional, Developmental Relationships® can be greatly supported by identifying student's strengths, supports, and resources within themselves and their community. This identification can be done on a community level by measuring assets through distributing surveys to students. The surveys are completely anonymous, and no individual identifying information is collected. The Search Institute® has already created these evidence-based surveys. Their researchers analyze the data collected and create a report of the results. The researchers then create a report describing what the data says. Researchers speak directly with community leaders to discuss the report and answer questions. Facilitators from the Search Institute® can then conduct workshops in the community to go over the research report with the public and guide the attending community members as the community decides possible interventions.

With the assistance of community residents, Lake Cities Focus is hopeful to gather approximately 1,000 completed surveys. This number will help ensure that the data collected is an accurate representation of all middle school and high school students in the Lake Cities area. The surveys are anonymous, and the responses to the questions will all be combined to determine overall trends.  

To learn more, Contact Us or visit the Search Institute®.