Huddle lead: Paul Kuttner, Associate Director for Community Engaged Scholarship at University Neighborhood Partners, University of Utah
 
Evaluation — seeking to understand what we are accomplishing and holding ourselves accountable for doing what we intend to do — can be a powerful learning process. It can be a chance to build self-knowledge, improve practice, and dialogue with partners. It can also satisfy funding requirements and help make the case to our institutions for continued support. Documenting and telling our stories can draw in new partners, connect people across projects, and inform larger movements for community engagement and social change. 

However, evaluation comes with many challenges, such as the different data demands of stakeholders and scarcity of time and resources. More fundamentally, Western, neoliberal frameworks for quantifying “outcomes” and “impact” are often at odds with the complex, relational, humanistic, and transformative nature of partnership work.

In this CUMU Huddle, we will explore best practices and next practices in evaluating and documenting community-campus partnerships. We will have opportunities to share successes and struggles across our institutions, and will bring in speakers who are exploring the frontiers of this work. Our agenda will be guided by the interests of those who participate. Join us!

If you have any questions, please email ddarr@cumuonline.org.