How We Developed Our Approach to Evaluation and Consulting

All of our work is based in Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) Participatory Action Research (PAR), and culturally responsive and equitable (CREE) methods.  These research techniques fully engage community partners as leaders and experts in the research or evaluation process.  In this type of work, community members lead the project with trained researchers as guides or coaches in research or evaluation techniques and principles.  These techniques and their variations (everything from Youth Participatory Action Research/ YPAR, to Community-Based Participatory Evaluation/ CBPE) are based on the principle of disrupting the traditional power structures inherent in research and evaluation projects.  Through our research approach we disrupt these dynamics by redefining who is considered an “expert,” what questions and information are deemed worthy, who gets to hold and create knowledge, and how information is collected and distributed. Furthermore, in redefining the research process, we aim to reject and interrupt the historical legacies of abuse created by traditional research processes.

This is why accessibility is so important to us. Even with the most well-intentioned researchers and research methodology, institutional power dynamics are often present. We aim to disrupt power-hoarding by funding entities and knowledge gate-keepers by helping organizations integrate evaluation into their work in ways that are easy and valuable and that allow them to maintain control of information at all stages.

The techniques we use draw from Collaborative, Participatory, and Empowerment Evaluation techniques, Culturally-Responsive Evaluation (CRE), and other equity-based evaluation methodologies, as well as intersectional feminism, critical race theory (CRT), and the teachings of scholars and leaders working in social justice and equity spaces.

We are currently working on a list of resources and blog posts on these topics. In the meantime you can always utilize internet search resources or contact us for a conversation.

Learn more about how we got here on the blog.