Grab that Croissant! APEP Breakfast on New Survey Method on Feb. 26th at 8:15AM
No surprise here: breakfast is indeed our favorite meal of the day. So join us for another one of APEP’s trademark breakfasts next week when we welcome Brookings’ Russ Whitehurst and David Stuit of Basis Policy Research for a presentation and Q&A on a new advocacy evaluation method they call “Survey with Placebo.” Be sure to check out their report here. Let us know if you’ll be coming by filling out an RSVP form. As usual, you provide the tawk; we provide the hot coffee caffeine and pastries carbs.
Re-Reads
A lot has been written about FSG’s “collective impact” approach. But we think this recent piece in the Stanford Social Innovation Review merits a special mention. In it, Chris Thompson of the Fund for Our Economic Future tells us about his “personal collective impact journey” and presents three lessons for those pursuing collective impact. Nothing surprising for advocates and others in the trenches of social change, perhaps; but we’re thrilled to see evidence that funders are actively questioning their own role. Take a look at the comments section for a digital back-and-forth on the implications for philanthropoids.
Explaining Desired Change
We really like the Global Fund for Women’s website: it’s colorful, user-friendly, and informative too! We recently visited their “How We Grant” section and were impressed with the way they present their theory of change, their four key assumptions, and how individual activities contribute to their desired impact. In fact, their change matrix reminded us a bit of Julia Coffman’s handy framework for public policy grantmaking. (And yes, we can’t help but love those bubble graphs.)
