Evaluation Lab Fellows recently shared evaluation plans with the four participating community organizations in the 2019-2020 Evaluation Lab: Las Cumbres Community Services, Enlace Comunitario, PB&J Family Services, and Centro Sávila.  Each year, the Evaluation Lab convenes teams of graduate students, faculty members, professional evaluators and nonprofit organization staff to develop and support internal evaluation systems.  The teams function as learning communities, where students learn about social justice action and organizations develop capacity for evaluation that leads to program improvement. 

Fellows Alex Willey, Sam Hatch, and Bhavya Pandey are working with Las Cumbres Community Services. They plan to look at one of the organization’s newer programs, Nurturing Centers in elementary schools in Taos and Peñasco.   The Centers aim to teach kids the five domains for Social and Emotional Learning, and they provide a safe and healing space for children in the midst of turmoil at home. Alex and Sam will help the Nurturing Center staff develop an evaluation plan to track the program’s impact.  

Fellows Gabby Rivera and Mary Lopez (pictured) are partnered with Enlace Comunitario to evaluate the LIDER Program. The LIDER Program is a brand-new program and trains women of color for non-profit leadership positions.  Evaluation activities include participant focus groups and a review of two other similar training programs, in order to inform revisions to the LIDER curriculum.

Fellows Jessica Hitzman and Emily Guerra are working with PB&J Family Services on a client satisfaction survey that will assess the quality of client-staff interactions. They have started conducting focus groups with clients and staff to identify core principles and best practices for building trust and supporting healthy parent-child bonds.

Finally, working with Centro Savila are Fellows Joseph Gonzales and Camille Velarde. As Centro Sávila has been experiencing rapid growth, the team plans to assess whether the organization’s goals still align with activities and resources, as well as how the staff perceives the ongoing organizational restructuring.