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EARLY CHILDHOOD DEVELOPMENT

Glossary:

Hypothesis: A statement of the goal, “theory of change,” or long term outcome (of the project funded by the foundation or the part of your organization that relates to the foundation’s focus) often phrased as “If ..., then ...”. For example, a hypothesis might be “If our agency provides mindfulness training for low-income parents, then we will increase the likelihood that these young parents will be able to effectively connect with their newborn baby.”

Objectives (Also called “outputs” in some evaluation models): You will use these (and your Outcomes) for the report to gauge your success. Objectives both describe your program and answer the questions:

Who? (# of families, parents, children)
What? (services? workshops? home visits? clinic visits?, etc.)
When? (how often? over what period of time?)
Where?
How (peer-taught?, Community College course?, etc.)
Why?

Example: “20 parents will participate in 8 workshops on mindfulness meditation once a week for 8 weeks at the Maple Neighborhood Community Center, which will be taught by two interns from the local professional yoga training program. This will decrease parents’ stress levels, increasing their ability to provide a nurturing environment for their babies.”

Outcomes: These are the long term results of your project that refer back to the objectives. For example, looking at the objective above, an outcome might be, “80% of the parents who take the workshops will state that they are better able to manage stress and are more emotionally available for their children, as reported through pre- and post- questionnaires, home visits by staff, or both.” You can have multiple outcomes; each objective, for example, can have its own outcome. Outcomes are measurable ways to test your hypothesis.

Data Collection: May include client evaluations, attendance records, staff reports, tests, pre- and post- questionnaires, observations, etc.

Program/Project: These two words are used interchangeably, and may or may not be applicable to your grant, as sometimes a grant will be made for general operating support. However, when the foundation does make an operating grant, the evaluation should focus on the program or project in which Bella Vista is most interested.