Building Evidence to Strengthen Nonprofit Programming

Com­mu­ni­ty-based pro­grams are crit­i­cal to the com­mu­ni­ties they serve. Often led by peers from the same cul­tur­al back­ground, they pro­vide acces­si­ble ser­vices to youth, espe­cial­ly chil­dren of col­or. This shared con­nec­tion fos­ters trust, enables tai­lored approach­es and ensures pro­grams effec­tive­ly meet needs.

Unfor­tu­nate­ly, too many of these orga­ni­za­tions oper­ate on razor-thin bud­gets, with few­er assets and less access to well-resourced net­works. This ham­pers their access to data and evi­dence tools that help refine, improve and expand pro­gram­ming crit­i­cal to the peo­ple they serve.

A strat­e­gy helps com­mu­ni­ty-based pro­grams around the coun­try improve their col­lec­tion and use of data to bet­ter serve their com­mu­ni­ties. It is the sub­ject of a recent report from the Annie E. Casey Foun­da­tion: Build­ing Evi­dence to Advance Equi­ty.

The Val­ue of Using Data to Advance Equity

The strat­e­gy was launched in 2016, when Casey iden­ti­fied sev­er­al non­prof­its that were doing impor­tant work but need­ed resources to col­lect and build evi­dence to advance their work. Casey’s Evi­dence-Based Prac­tice Group helped these orga­ni­za­tions in a vari­ety of ways, includ­ing devel­op­ing log­ic mod­els and the­o­ries of change that artic­u­lat­ed their approach, data sys­tems to mon­i­tor their progress and plan­ning for eval­u­a­tion to make the case for pro­gram expansion.

Since the strategy’s incep­tion, 16 grantee orga­ni­za­tions have par­tic­i­pat­ed as a net­work. Build­ing Evi­dence to Advance Equi­ty high­lights how four of the orga­ni­za­tions used the approach to mea­sure results, refine their work and bring effec­tive prac­tices or pro­grams to scale. They include:

• Con Mi MADRE (Moth­ers and Daugh­ters Rais­ing Expec­ta­tions), based in Texas, which focus­es on young Lati­nas and their moth­ers, with a goal of increas­ing col­lege atten­dance and completion;
• Peer Health Exchange, a nation­al youth health-equi­ty non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that works with young peo­ple to build health­i­er communities;
• Lati­nos in Action, which helps Lati­no stu­dents build aca­d­e­m­ic, ser­vice and lead­er­ship abil­i­ties, with the goal of com­plet­ing col­lege; and
• Future Foun­da­tion, an Atlanta-based orga­ni­za­tion that works to pre­pare stu­dents for college.

The sup­port has helped grantees ful­ly embrace the val­ue of using data and evi­dence to more effec­tive­ly advance equi­ty for the young peo­ple of col­or in their communities.

“We want to make sure our pro­gram man­agers and direc­tors ful­ly under­stand the cri­te­ria for eval­u­at­ing our pro­grams and the met­rics and mile­stones to chart where we’re going,” said Ron­nette V. Smith, chief exec­u­tive offi­cer of Future Foun­da­tion. ​“We want every­one in the enter­prise, from the jan­i­tor to the CEO, from secu­ri­ty offi­cers to bus dri­vers, to under­stand what the stan­dard is for suc­cess and how we mea­sure it.”

Lessons from Build­ing Evi­dence to Advance Equity

The report details sev­er­al key lessons from the grantees it spotlights:

• The approach needs to be flex­i­ble and tai­lor assis­tance to work with grantees of vary­ing sizes, expe­ri­ences and capac­i­ties in using data and evidence.
• This kind of grant mak­ing requires patience, and orga­ni­za­tions may need sus­tained sup­port to advance their evi­dence-build­ing capac­i­ty and eval­u­a­tion readi­ness. In such cas­es, a mul­ti-year fund­ing hori­zon is valuable.
• Grantee con­ven­ing — espe­cial­ly gath­er­ings with agen­das planned by the grantees — helped par­tic­i­pants learn from one another.
• Expand­ing the def­i­n­i­tion and use of data can make youth inter­ven­tions more effec­tive and increase the sup­ply of cul­tur­al­ly respon­sive programs.
• Fun­ders should under­stand that data for man­age­ment and strate­gic deci­sion mak­ing might look dif­fer­ent amid increas­ing demand for services.

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