BLOG

Engaged Evaluation

For the past several months, Nexus has been hard at work co-creating an evaluation system that better captures our work and the work of our grantees. As an intermediary, Nexus relies on our grantees' data to show our work is producing positive results in our geographic areas. We know that our data is only as good as theirs and their ability to capture it. Typically, organizations that provide funding, determine the information they need and then tell their grantees to collect the information. This process often adds unnecessary levels of work and stress to already resource-strained organizations.

 

Frustrations often cited by community organizations include:

• Organizations don't know they need to be collecting certain data at the time the grant is approved.

• Different funders will have different interests and therefore ask for very different types of information, creating the need for multiple data collection tools and processes.

• Questions funders are asking, or data they're asking organizations to collect, aren't the relevant questions or the relevant data, leaving organizations to feel that there is a lack of understanding about their work and the broader context within which that work takes place.

• Organizations lack the capacity - staff and/or systems - to collect and report on the data.

As Nexus proceeded to build an evaluation system and tools, we didn't want to add layers of work to our grantees and we wanted to ensure our evaluation was reflective of their work and relevant. Nexus' primary focus was on the development of a new Grant Request and Grant Reporting form along with an online database to better enable our grantees to capture and communicate their work. Before we began drafting these new forms, we invited our grantees in for a series of conversations. We divided our grantees into our two focus areas - Community Engagement and Asset and Wealth Building. 

Our first meeting with our grantees was to talk about evaluation broadly. We wanted to share Nexus' intention and goals for 2010, but also to learn more about our grantees' evaluation process and procedures. During the meetings we discussed organizational values around evaluation and how those values are reflected in their evaluation process and procedures. We also heard from the organizations what they believe is the relevant information to track in order to capture the true nature of their work and the work of community building.

The grantees came back a week later to meet with our evaluator. In this meeting we discussed the types of information they are currently capturing and what information might be missing. The organizations agreed to complete an online Evaluation Survey detailing the information being captured, so that Nexus could build on their data and identify areas where additional capacity and information might be needed.

Based on this information, our evaluator began drafting Nexus' Grant Request and Grant Reporting forms. During the meetings with our Community Engagement grantees the discussion focused on creating a Community Engagement survey - a tool that could capture the rich and complex work of engagement. Our evaluator agreed to take the information the groups provided and draft a Community Engagement Survey that each organization would implement.

We are excited by the response we've received from our grantee partners and for the ongoing development of evaluation tools that will bring added value to the work of our grantees, Nexus and the field of community building and community development more broadly.

---