The Harvard Family Research Project separated from the Harvard Graduate School of Education to become the Global Family Research Project as of January 1, 2017. It is no longer affiliated with Harvard University.
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What does monitoring and evaluation look like for real-life advocates?
Stephanie Schaefer, codirector of research at Fight Crime: Invest in Kids—a national nonprofit, bipartisan organization of law enforcement leaders and violence survivors—describes how they use evaluation to inform their advocacy and demonstrate their impact.
Evaluating Nonprofit Advocacy Simply: An Oxymoron?
Marcia Egbert and Susan Hoechstetter offer nine principles to guide advocacy evaluation, based on a recent and groundbreaking Alliance for Justice tool on this topic.
Continuous Progress: Better Advocacy Through Evaluation
Edith Asibey and David Devlin-Foltz describe the new Continuous Progress website, which helps advocates and grantmakers collaboratively plan and evaluate advocacy efforts.
A Guide to Measuring Advocacy and Policy
Organizational Research Services identifies outcomes associated with advocacy and policy work based on its new resource, A Guide to Measuring Advocacy and Policy.
Using and Evaluating Social Media for Social Change
Allison H. Fine is a senior fellow at Demos, a network of action and ideas based in New York City. She writes and speaks on increasing civic participation by harnessing the power of digital technology. In 2006, she published her latest book, Momentum: Igniting Social Change in the Connected Age.
The eNonprofit Benchmarks Study: Diving Into Email Metrics
Karen Matheson from M+R Strategic Services describes a recent study that helps nonprofits measure and interpret their online advocacy and fundraising success.
Constituency Building and Policy Work: Three Paradigms
Janice Hirota and Robin Jacobowitz describe three paradigms that show how constituency building and policy change efforts can work together to achieve sustainable and systemic reform.
From the Director's Desk
An introduction to the issue on Advocacy and Policy Change by HFRP's Founder & Director, Heather B. Weiss, Ed.D.
An Emerging Framework for Assessing Nonprofit Networks
Based on their new handbook Net Gains, Madeleine Taylor and Peter Pastrik offer guidelines on how to evaluate nonprofit networks that are used to achieve social change goals.
What's Different About Evaluating Advocacy and Policy Change?
Julia Coffman of HFRP describes four ways evaluators may need to adjust their approaches when evaluating advocacy and policy change.
Strategies for Assessing Policy Change Efforts: A Prospective Approach
Justin Louie and Kendall Guthrie of Blueprint Research and Design outline the steps for advocacy and policy change evaluators to follow in using a prospective approach to evaluation.
Evaluating Advocates' Spheres of Influence With Domain Leaders
The evaluation of the Center for Tobacco-Free Kids gathered data from a wide range of audiences that the advocacy organization targets in order to influence public policy.
New & Noteworthy
The New & Noteworthy section features an annotated list of papers, organizations, initiatives, and other resources related to the issue's theme of Advocacy and Policy change.
Working With Logic Models to Evaluate a Policy and Advocacy Program
Authors from the Institute for Health Policy Studies at the University of California, San Francisco describe how they used both macro-level and individual grantee logic models to drive the evaluation design of the Clinic Consortia Policy and Advocacy Program.
Ten Takeaways on Evaluating Advocacy and Policy Change
HFRP summarizes key observations raised in this issue of The Evaluation Exchange. Note that the focus here is on advocacy that informs public policy at the local, state, or federal levels.
Necessity Leads to Innovative Evaluation Approach and Practice
Innovation Network describes their methodological innovation—the intense-period debrief—use to engage advocates in evaluative inquiry shortly after a policy window or intense period of action.
Pioneers in the Field: Four Foundations on Advocacy Evaluation
Representatives from four foundations discuss their expectations and approaches for assessing their advocacy and public policy grantmaking.
A Conversation With Kay Monaco
Kay Monaco, former executive director of New Mexico Voices for Children, discusses the role that evaluation plays in her organization's efforts to change public policy.
Evaluating an Issue's Position on the Policy Agenda: The Bellwether Methodology
Policy issues need both visibility and momentum to be transformed into political action. Harvard Family Research Project's bellwether methodology helps evaluators assess if both characteristics are emerging.
Evaluation Based on Theories of the Policy Process
Harvard Family Research Project explains how it helps to ground evaluation in theories of the policy process.
Discovery Youth: A Museum-Based Program Connecting Youth With Community
Jessica Intrator from the Children's Discovery Museum describes a program that connects youth with a community institution to promote technology skills, health awareness, and positive social and academic outcomes.
Building Connections Between After School Programs and the Business Community
Andy Muñoz of City Year and Glenn Zaccara of T-Mobile talk about how their organizations link OST programs, businesses, and communities to support quality programming for youth.
The Posse Foundation: Moving Beyond Test Scores to Identify High-Potential Youth
Rassan Salandy of the Posse Foundation explains how one after school program works with universities and businesses to prepare high school students for success in college and beyond.
An Impact Evaluation of Academic Instruction for After School Programs
Alison Black and Fred Doolittle from MDRC describe the evaluation of an enhanced academic instruction approach for after school programs.
Connecting Latino Families With Out-of-School Time Opportunities
Nathaniel Riggs describes the implementation and evaluation of the Generación Diez program, which connects Latino families with after school programming, social services, and the school community.