Center for Evaluation Innovation

?? Announcing the 2023 Benchmarking Foundation Learning and Evaluation Practices Report! This year’s report comes at a critical moment: Foundations across the country are changing how they work to be equitable, trust-based, and community-centered. Learning and evaluation practices are no different. We surveyed over 100 foundations to explore evaluation and learning practices across the philanthropic sector. Our research showed that while foundations are making strides to strengthen diversity and equity efforts, more work remains. Access the full 2023 Benchmarking Report to learn more ???? https://lnkd.in/dJgEsYXJ

It's not enough to just avoid confirmation bias. Philanthropy must seek disconfirmation bias. This piece from Kecia Bertermann and Andy Martin explores lessons from other fields' experiences in ignoring disconfirming evidence and offers three opportunities for philanthropy to confront this issue. Read on here: https://lnkd.in/gSSnJZWh

We are so excited about this (gorgeous!) publication from Borealis Philanthropy's Racial Equity to Accelerate Change Fund and Research Action Design (RAD.cat). "In fact, the ways that most nonprofit organizations operate, organize themselves, compensate their staff, and compete with each other for funding replicate the racist and economic inequities and power distributions of dominant white-supremacist, cis-hetero-patriarchal, and ableist values that limit marginalized people’s access to power and decision-making." ?? ?? ?? Explore this resource here: https://lnkd.in/dYM9UVY8

Interested in learning more about advocacy and public policy evaluation? We've got resources for that. Check them out here: https://bit.ly/4gsiHrr?

We're just *one month* out from this year's annual American Evaluation Association Conference! We cannot wait to attend, learn, and connect with you all. Follow our page and subscribe to our newsletter for more information on our sessions as we get closer: https://lnkd.in/dinRkib2

Listen now ?? : Our Director of Programs and Strategic Learning, Chantias Ford, joins Monique Curry-Mims & Valerie Johnson on the Beyond Philanthropy Podcast to discuss the framework of #trustbasedphilanthropy, misperceptions, trust washing, and the future of trust in philanthropy. "This movement, this work, has been a call funders in to say we should shift and we can shift. And these are the funders who are doing it. This isn't a checklist. We put up all these walls and curtains, making it seem so complex and secretive. Yes, there's rigor to it, of course, but it doesn't require the complexity and secrecy we put on it as a sector. Not even a little bit now." Happy listening!

As we celebrate our 15th anniversary by revisiting some of our favorite resources, we're turning next to a crucial one: Re-Thinking How We Work with Boards on Evaluation and Learning. Mariah Brothe Gantz reconsiders this important piece and explores what it would look like to apply a racial equity lens.

“Systems-change mental models and our strategies, tools, and approaches to learning need to match the systems in which we are working, as well as the nature, scope, and szie of the problems we are trying to solve.”?- Jewlya Lynn & Julia Coffman Read on to learn more about how to align your systems change mental models with your actions and strategies: https://bit.ly/3ZmMzj5

We're so excited to revisit this resource as part of our 15th anniversary celebration. Albertina Lopez, PhD reflects on a piece that is foundational to learning amidst complexity and offers her own additions 11 years later. Read her reflections here: