The Greater Houston Community Panel comprises 7,500 local residents who are age 18 and older, speak English or Spanish, and who were randomly selected to be representative of all adults living in Harris, Fort Bend and Montgomery counties — a region that represents one in five Texans.
Panel members are surveyed every few months about their families, their communities, their health, their wellbeing, their expectations, their opinions, their priorities, and their aspirations. The surveys are conducted via the internet, by telephone, and through in-person interviews.
The Kinder Institute for Urban Research partners with local community organizations to ensure that the panel includes members of the region's most disadvantaged and hard-to-reach populations. Insights from each wave of the survey are used to inform city policies and community programming to produce better outcomes for Houston area residents. Additionally, the panel is monitored continually to ensure that the members are representative of the area’s ever diversifying population. New panel members are recruited as needed to maintain full socioeconomic and demographic representation.
The Greater Houston Community Panel is a community-based research initiative jointly led by Rice University’s Kinder Institute for Urban Research and the University of Texas School of Public Health. The initiative is made possible through the generous support of the Kinder Foundation and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Were you invited to join the panel? Visit our frequently asked questions page for more information.