Knowledge Development and Evaluation Research Questions
There is a growing interest among people who commission evaluation (often funders of racial equity, community change or other similar work) in the use of evaluation for learning – either instead of or in addition to its use as a tool of accountability. This section includes examples of knowledge development frameworks and tools being developed in support of racial equity goals, as well as frameworks and tools that help groups identify research questions for accountability type evaluations.
In either instance (for knowledge development, evaluation or both), much of the upfront work has to do with crafting a set of questions to guide the work. One way to think about guiding questions is to look at the characteristics of ‘good’ outcomes (See Tip Sheet [[What is an Outcome and What is an Outcome Indicator?]]). Like good outcomes, effective and useful guiding questions for evaluation or knowledge development should be [...]
“Transformation doesn’t happen in a linear way, at least not one we can always track. It happens in cycles, convergences, explosions. If we release the framework of failure, we can realize that we are in iterative cycles, and we can keep asking ourselves – how do I learn from this? . . . In a non-linear process, everything is part of the learning, every step. That includes constructive criticism, it is part of the feedback loop – experiment, gather feedback, experiment again. This is how we learn.”
~ adrienne maree brown, Emergent Strategy
SPOTLIGHT
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GLOSSARY