Greetings! We’re Jean-Marie Callan and Becky Seel, members of the Oregon Community Foundation (OCF) Research & Learning team who enjoy exploring opportunities to learn among and alongside the projects we fund.
In Oregon, Chinook salmon migrate many miles from the Pacific Ocean back to their natal waters in the Columbia River Basin, aided by inherited senses and magnetic maps. Scientists are learning how they also use “collective navigation” and social interactions to help find their way by tapping into a group’s wisdom.
We’ve seen the power of collective learning in our work, too – enriching our learning and deepening evaluation.
Learning communities (LCs) are groups of practitioners who come together to learn while pursuing work independently. OCF’s first learning community, 20 years ago, functioned primarily to share information and provide technical assistance to nonprofits we fund. Since then, LCs have evolved and expanded in our work. Two recent examples demonstrate the range of roles LCs can play:
- The Arts Education LC was led by arts education advocates, who created goals emphasizing healing, creativity and connection for teachers/artists, schools, students, and communities. Participants were compensated and honed a monthly meeting structure with shared leadership, deliberate pace, and creative practices. After 2 years, they emerged as a close network with action plans for a stronger statewide arts education ecosystem.
- Prompted by requests – especially from partners in remote rural areas – our Project Turnkey LC convened leaders from 32 housing programs. Three gatherings were intentionally designed to center the learning of participants and held separately from external evaluation efforts. This focus helped to support open sharing amongst participants and informed the creation of resources specifically for participants’ use.
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As these examples suggest, our approaches need to reflect each unique initiative. From these recent experiences, we see 3 essential, and inter-related ingredients to foster learning from the ground up:
- Development over time: creation of goals, content, and practices may unfold over the course of months (or more!) and continue to iterate. Recognizing this, it’s important to not start with a set of rigid expectations for the series, to practice patience through stops and starts, and to let the learning community evolve or extend. This requires open facilitation that holds space for uncertainty. It requires listening and adapting.
- Relationship-building: Relationships are foundational for what we can build together and critical connective cement for our learning. They are both a process and an outcome that solidifies and sustains the work. It’s helpful to meet in-person and to take time for connection, creativity, fun, and reflection through unstructured meals, somatic practice, or arts activities.
- Support for the whole human: Participation takes time, money, and energy- which can become barriers, especially in some settings. Elements like compensation for participation, childcare reimbursement, and food, and fostering peer supports demonstrate care and support relationship building. These supports helped people show up for the learning community, connect meaningfully, and feel valued for their contributions.
These components support collective learning, and in turn can help us – like the Chinook salmon – get somewhere new. Through peer learning, we gain: - Increased understanding across distinct roles and geography;
- Learning that’s relevant, useful and shaped by participants;
- Identification of opportunities, energy and alignment in a field;
- Validation of lived experience as expertise.
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These communities help us evolve as evaluators, too. By grounding ourselves in LCs, we are participants in stories of growth as they unfold. To learn more about applying this practice in your work, see Learn and let learn: supporting learning communities for innovation and impact from NYU Wagner and Grantmakers for Effective Organizations.
We’re looking forward to the fall and the Evaluation 2024 conference with our colleagues in the Local Arrangements Working Group (LAWG). Do you have questions, concerns, kudos, or content to extend this AEA365 contribution? Please add them in the comments section for this post on the AEA365 webpage so that we may enrich our community of practice. Would you like to contribute to AEA365? Review the contribution guidelines and send your draft post to AEA365@eval.org. The views and opinions expressed on the AEA365 blog are solely those of the original authors and other contributors. These views and opinions do not necessarily represent those of the American Evaluation Association, and/or any/all contributors to this site.