Evaluation

It is critical for community-based initiatives to have information to guide and inform their efforts. We believe that evaluation should be participatory – used to help shape the initiative over time, not just a one-time summative judgment at the end of the initiative.

Our Center provides support and evaluation services for local, state, national, and international initiatives. Illustrative evaluation partners and clients include:

• Drug-Free Communities-funded substance use prevention coalitions
• Local health departments documenting implementation of their community health improvement plan
• Multi-sector community-based initiatives
• State health departments
• Foundations
• World Health Organization regional partners

We can support your initiative through development of logic models, conducting community needs assessments, program evaluations, and creating evaluation plans. We have extensive experience in systematic documentation and evaluation of community and systems change, including through use of the Community Check Box Evaluation System.

Our multidisciplinary Center staff have decades of experience supporting community-based research and evaluation. Current and past evaluation experience includes the areas of taking action to address social determinants of health, substance use prevention, youth development, chronic disease, violence prevention, community development, health equity, and other collective impact efforts.