NATIONAL FRAMEWORK FOR CRED PROGRAM INDICATORS

Update from the Grassroots Collaboration

Galaxy IVSeptember 18, 2013Pittsburgh, PA

Our Team

Mary Simon Leuci, University of Missouri Charlie French, University of New Hampshire Deborah Tootle, Iowa State University Paul Lachapelle, Montana State University Scott Chazdon, University of Minnesota Susan Jakes, North Carolina State University Walt Whitmer, Pennsylvania State University Sandra Thompson, Florida A&M University Aida Balsano, USDA-NIFA Rachel Welborn, Southern Rural Development

Center

Our Goals for Today

A brief snapshot of how we got here Launch of the national initiative in

2012 Current status and efforts update Current challenges and next steps Get your input and guidance

What’s Driving Us…

Need to tell compelling story at state, local, and national levels about collective impact of our community and economic development work

To improve our ability to: Gather and assess collective impacts and

leverage each other’s strengths Develop support for CRED programming Make strategic decisions regarding the

importance, value, and potential of CRED programs

How We Got Here Historical discussion of need for collective

impacts across program, state, regional, and national levels

North Central Region took the lead beginning work in 2006

South began to follow NC lead – then Northeast and Western regions, all assisted by the RRDCs

Daylong workshop held at NACDEP (2012) culminating in launch of the National Initiative and core team

Our Immediate Goals

Build national network of partners to establish common framework for capturing and sharing the impact of CRED work

Identify core set of indicators that convey impact of our work regionally and nationally, while recognizing our diversity

Develop and share set of user-friendly tools and instruments that partners (or states and regions) can use to collect impact data

Identify ways of leveraging each other's resources and strengths to enhance our impacts on communities

Our Challenges

Diversity of: Programs within CRED State and regional programs and

priorities Data collection methods across states

and regions Stakeholders and what information is

most important to them

Our Challenges

Attributing community or organizational impact to our work

Limited (but emerging) consensus around what is most important and feasible to measure

Consistency of indicators and aggregation

Time and resources

Brief Regional Updates

NortheastWest

South

North Central

North Central

Work to identify common indicators across CD programs began in 2006 Tied to program logic models. Collaboratively defined, collected and

compiled impact indicators and published report since 2010 (4 years).

Data compiled, maintained and published at NCRCRD.

Indicators mostly economic, several reflect social and civic engagement.

North Central

Each state enters data on EXCEL spreadsheet.

Includes space for vignettes. Not every state will report on all

indicators. But all states are reporting on some of the indicators.

Program leaders revisit indicators each year.

North Central

Report is shared with extension directors, NIFA, other partners and used in each state.

Each state also uses its own data within the state.

Collecting data and tracking impact challenging because of differences across states.

South

Similar to North Central structure and process.

Data compiled, maintained and published at SRDC.

Major difference in South – 1890 LGUs. Organizational structure and data needs differ from 1862 LGUs.

Has built a list of indicators based on NC Region with some modifications

Data collection initiated in August 2013.

South

First year will be mostly a test case, and work toward better data collection in 2014.

Have strong regional team. Initial work logic models too

cumbersome went straight indicators of impact.

See national collaboration as critical to building the collective knowledge; has been key resource for south.

Northeast Completed regional survey of potential

indicators and related issues Fall 2012. Next steps – program leaders/state

contacts buy-in. Several states working on developing

common reporting system. VT, NH, ME, and MA including activity data, outcome indicators, data collection, and narratives. http://lmprs.net/.

Northeast

Key survey findings include: Do not perceive ourselves as doing a

good job evaluating the impact of our work.

Strong desire by most to be more effective at measuring impacts and thinking how we can do this regionally.

To be realistic with our expectations, we should hone in on a set of 5(ish) indicators that span across CED functions that we can all agree upon.

West

Last region to get involved Now moving forward – 3 states

cooperating APLU's Commission on Innovation,

Competitiveness, and Economic Prosperity (CICEP)

The Metrics Working Group

1890 Institutions

Currently working with the Southern Region

Not all institutions represented

Sample preliminary indicators include: Number of loan applications for

youth and adults Number of youth and adult

business start-ups Number of community-based

food and other products markets Number of youth and adult

business expansions Number of business feasibility

studies conducted

Number of jobs created or retained

Number of tax-exempt organization (CDCs) trainings conducted

Number of tax-exempt organization (CDCs) start-ups

Number of community based meetings (mapping, organizing, visioning, recognition)

Number of enterprise development and expansion trainings conducted for youth and adults

Number of land retention and estate planning trainings conducted

Discussion & Questions

What state are you from? What questions or issues does all this

raise? Do the indicators identified make

sense? What more would you like to see as

all this evolves?

2013-14 Plans Gather input from this meeting and national CRED

meeting of PLs (9-16-2013) Establish opportunities for others to provide input

and join us. Continue to refine regional indicators and enhance

the processes for collection and compilation. Set of indicators nationally identified by 1/1/2014. Develop preliminary National CRED Impacts Report

end of fiscal year (2013 data). Another year before aggregate with multiple

regions. Focus on how we use the data to tell the stories of

our impact Keep making progress…

THANK YOU!Follow-up Survey: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/CREDIND13

For more Information, contact:NC: Mary Simon Leuci, leucim@missouri.eduSouth: Susan Jakes, susan_jakes@ncsu.eduWest: Paul Lachapelle, paul.lachapelle@montana.eduNE: Walt Whitmer, wew2@psu.edu, Charlie French, charlie.french@unh.edu1890: Sandra Thompson, sandra.thompson@famu.edu