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Resources

 

The Annotated Guide to Tools & Resources provides tools, frameworks, and resources to help you develop and implement your evaluation. It’s a repository of useful, practical materials that can help you create an evaluation plan; design your evaluation approach; develop or adapt tools and instruments; and otherwise move your evaluation forward.

This Guide was originally assembled from many sources and fields and annotated by evaluator Suzanne Callahan of Callahan Consulting for the Arts. We continue to add resources. Your suggestions are welcome!
 

Do you have a useful tool or resource to add?  Contact animatingdemocracy@artsusa.org  

 

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A Developmental Evaluation Primer

By Jamie A. A. Gamble

This short book defines developmental evaluation and addresses some myths. Offering an alternative approach to linear logic of traditional methods, developmental evaluation supports the process of innovation within an organization and its activities. The book outlines developmental evaluation's uses in innovation and developing project ideas and defends the approach's credibility. It is an appropriate resource for organizations that work in an innovative manner and thus seems tailored to arts organizations.

0

book / article, practical tool

A Handbook of Data Collection Tools: Companion to A Guide to Measuring Advocacy and Policy

By Jane Reisman, Anne Gienapp, Sarah Stachowiak

An outstanding piece, this 51-page handbook presents a great discussion of outcomes as they relate to policy and advocacy. Intended for grantmakers but useful for nonprofits as well, it encourages users to think about measurement of advocacy and policy efforts toward social change. It offers outcomes lists, examples of data collection tools, and many sample instruments from which users may benefit.

4

practical tool

Action Evaluation

By Jay Rothman

This 5-page article on Action Evaluation from the Beyond Intractability website provides a knowledge base and tools regarding social conflict resolution and community reconciliation. This article assists participants, funders, and facilitators in reaching consensus about what they seek to accomplish (people's goals), why (their values and beliefs), and how (suggested account strategies). The article addresses the process in three stages: establishing the baseline, formative monitoring, and summative evaluation.

4

book / article, practical tool

Advocacy Evaluation Project

By Innovation Network, Inc. (Innonet)

The Advocacy Evaluation Project, orchestrated by Innovation Network (Innonet), began in 2005 to move the field of advocacy evaluation beyond assessing policy change into one that considers more fundamental and contributory components of advocacy efforts: capacity building, network formation, relationship building, communication, issue framing, and leadership development. In Phase I  the Advocacy Evaluation Resource Center was created. Now a part of Innonet's Point K Learning Center (which requires a free login), the Resource Center is a database .

5

database, practical tool, website

Art and Culture in Communities: A Framework for Measurement

By Maria Rosario Jackson, Joaquin Harranz

Based on several years of field research in communities around the U.S., this six-page brief presents an insightful framework for better capturing and measuring arts, culture, and creative expression at the neighborhood level.

3

book / article, case study, practical tool

Animating Democracy Resource

Art and Soul Project Community Survey, Starksboro, VT, Orton Family Foundation

By Chris Dwyer

This item relates to the Preliminary Menu of Possible Outcomes/Indicators/Measures from the Starksboro Art and Soul Project, as both are part of the Art and Soul Project. This item is a ten page community survey with thirty questions. The survey is an adaptation of a standard survey developed by the Orton Family Foundation to use in tracking changes in perceptions about land use planning in all their Heart and Soul community projects.

1

practical tool

Animating Democracy Resource

Artists Engaging in Social Change: A Continuum of Impact

Artists and the arts reflect society. Attuned to the social, political, and cultural currents of their time, artists’ work reveals untold stories and embodies and heralds the issues of the time. Artists’ work enters the public consciousness and public discourse. Artists and cultural organizations are increasingly playing a more deliberate role in making social change. Beyond reflection, the arts engage, animate and influence.

5

practical tool

Arts & Equity Initiative Survey Instruments

Arts & Equity collected information via online questionnaires using SurveyMonkey to learn the effects of the Police Poetry Project on core participants. To learn more about the survey instruments used for this project, visit http://impact.animatingdemocracy.org/resource/evaluation-plan-art-work-t.... This page includes the Police Participant Survey, the Poet Participant Survey, the Police and Poet Interviews, the Family Member Survey, and the Public Participant Survey.

0

practical tool

Animating Democracy Resource

Arts and Civic Engagement: Briefing Paper for Working Group of the Arts and Civic Engagement Impact Initiative

By Chris Dwyer

Written for Animating Democracy's Arts and Civic Engagement Impact Initiative Working Group, this 14- page paper presents a conceptual framework (or logic model) for arts-based engagement. It offers a discussion of the components of the framework, and a list of questions to guide research explorations.

0

book / article, practical tool

Arts and Culture Indicators Project

By Maria Rosario Jackson, Florence Kabwasa-Green

The site offers an overview of Urban Institute's Arts and Culture Indicators Project, defines cultural vitality, briefly addresses cultural vitality indicators, offers case study examples, and gives abstracts and links to high-quality relevant research studies. The site is a beautiful resource for arts and civic engagement practitioners and policymakers. Graphically strong with top notch research, it is a model for the field.

0

book / article, case study, practical tool, website