Participatory evaluation methods are a great option for nonprofits that want to incorporate their community’s voice into their decision-making and build their nonprofit's capacity. This is exactly what the Pima County 4-H Healthy Living Ambassadors (HLA) program wanted to do. So we incorporated an “Evaluation Skill-a-Thon” into their evaluation process.
In this video, you’ll see an example of a practical participatory evaluation. You can adapt this example to meet your own needs. Using a participatory approach is a great option if you’re interested in doing some evaluation capacity building and nonprofit capacity building. In a participatory approach, stakeholders take an active role in the evaluation. The evaluation is done either with or by stakeholders themselves. The aim is to include stakeholders in as much of the process as possible. I love doing this sort of work because it’s more likely to ensure the beneficiaries have a voice. Plus, nonprofits benefit because stakeholders are encouraged to contribute to the evaluation - potentially enabling more resources to go into the evaluation than would otherwise. I created this video for the 2020 American Evaluation Association Conference. At the conference, the HLA program and I presented a poster titled 4-H Evaluation Skill-a-Thon: Uplifting Youth’s Perspectives. Please reach out if you’re interested in more details: Michelle@ConnectingEvidece.com
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