It's Academic! InnoNet Helps Public School Advocacy Organization Improve Evaluation Capacity

by Shital Shah

Innovation Network has been chosen to lead an evaluation effort with the 21st Century School Fund ("21CSF"), a local advocacy organization created to improve public school facilities.  The 21st Century School Fund works with communities in Washington D.C. and across the U.S. to create healthy, safe, and educationally appropriate learning environments.

Our work will involve evaluation trainings, evaluation planning, and the development of data collection instruments for one of their community-based advocacy programs. The evaluation we have designed will give 21CSF a thorough understanding of the effectiveness and impact of their policy initiatives. In addition, we will work with them to develop a framework for ongoing evaluation of their advocacy efforts and a way to articulate to their outcomes to funders and other stakeholders.

1. Increased awareness of the terminology and techniques used in evaluation,
2. Clarification of their Theory of Change and Logic Model, and
3. A framework for assessing the short-, intermediate, and long-term outcomes of one of their programs.