Culturally Responsive Evaluation (CRE): Introduction and Inquiry

As a community-academic collaborative response to the ongoing social injustices and be in solidarity with Black Lives Matter, the Northeastern University Public Evaluation Lab (NU-PEL)’s Director, Tiana Yom, and the Greater Boston Evaluation Network (GBEN)’s Programming Team, Kelly Washburn and Calpurnynia Roberts, have partnered to create a virtual, year-long professional development and training series, focusing on Culturally Responsive Evaluation (CRE). The inaugural event took place on November 16, 2020 with guest speaker, Dr. Zinzi Bailey from University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Interdisciplinary Research Leaders program.

Dr. Bailey presented an introductory webinar on the history of CRE, guided participants through a case study of Team Justice for Native Children to show what and how CRE looks like in practice as well as provided several ways in which evaluators can actively deconstruct racist practices in evaluation and research in order to best identify and meet the needs of the community members. There was a diverse group of participants from various academic and non-academic backgrounds, ranging from university students to senior leadership members at large scale non-profit organizations. The event ended with a Q&A section where there were insightful dialogues on active versus passive antiracist approaches and what CRE can continue to look like present-day and beyond.

The link to the webinar can be found here.

NU-PEL and GBEN are committed to engaging in culturally responsive evaluation efforts and high-impact, community-engaged research to promote health equity, racial equity, and social justice. We look forward to continuing this very important CRE series.