For social sector leaders striving for equitable outcomes, incorporating a diversity, equity and inclusion lens for evidence building is critical — and often overlooked. Project Evident has been working to develop a structured process for promoting and integrating a diversity, equity and inclusion framework into the evidence building activities of an organization. The goal is…
Continuous Improvement and Evidence Building
Nonprofit organizations face high demand from communities for services, and increasing expectations from funders and policymakers for evidence of impact. For many years, traditional evaluations, such as randomized control trials (RCT), have been used to demonstrate the impact of programs. This evidence building method, if done prematurely, can often leave nonprofits with findings of minimal…
The Role of the Practitioner in the Next Generation of Evidence
In the next generation model for evidence building, we envision that practitioners become the drivers of their evidence agendas, equipped with the strategies, tools, and talent they need to rigorously evaluate their programs and strengthen outcomes for the communities they serve. We imagine an ecosystem less governed by power, misplaced incentives, and sluggish learning, and…
Empowering Practitioners to Drive the Evidence Train: Building the Next Generation of Evidence
The movement toward greater use of data and evidence in social programs is encouraging, and there is a widely shared commitment to achieving better outcomes for the vulnerable segments of society served by nonprofits. At the same time, the current paradigm for using evaluation to get those outcomes has faced challenges. It is time to…
Rethinking Early Childhood Policy: Finding Our Way Out of the Silos
It has been 15 years since the death of Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-New York). While at times provocative, Moynihan was a keen observer of the systemic barriers facing poor and underserved communities in the United States and respected across both parties for his policy and diplomatic leadership. Accordingly, his views on social policy can…