Like most people who enjoy policy and debate, I've been pretty tuned into the health care issue in the last several months. As a business owner, I have been particularly intersted in whether any of the proposed options will hold down our health care costs long-term, and what sort of obligations the proposed options will put on the Improve Group, our colleagues and our competitors.

I had the opportunity to chat with Michael Caputo of Minnesota Public Radio about employers, jobs and benefits recently. New state data shows that jobs offering health benefits have declined in even greater numbers than job openings generally. Hear the story and my reactions as a business owner here.

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A recent book (summarized here) by the National Committee for Responsible Philanthropy has received much ink and pixels by those who take issue with its premise that there are four basic criteria that should guide foundations:

* Values
* Effectiveness
* Ethics
* Commitment

The primary challenge in identifying, defining and using these basic criteria is that foundations are established to impact an extremely wide variety of causes. For example, here are the mottos of three of Minnesota's largest foundations:

Helping communities reduce poverty (Northwest Area Foundation)
Courageous leaders/vibrant communities (Bush Foundation)
Helping you make the most of your giving and working together to strengthen our community (Minneapolis Foundation)

Although each of these has a different focus, it seems like each would likely say they are guided by values, effectiveness, ethics, and commitment. So why the debate, such as that present in the comments to a recent Wall Street Journal article?

As in so many aspects of life, the devil is in the details. The criterion that has generated the most debate is values; NCRP suggests that philanthropy should be directed at those who need it the most and suggest that foundations direct at least half of their giving to the following marginalized groups: economically disadvantaged; racial or ethnic
minorities; women and girls; people with AIDS; people with disabilities; aging, elderly, and senior citizens; immigrants and refugees; crime/abuse victims; offenders and ex-offenders; single parents; and LGBTQ citizens, including these groups in other countries. Taken together, these groups are by far the majority of citizens (for example, my family fits into at least three of these categories; four if you consider that we are all aging all of the time!) and, most of the foundations I have become familiar with would meet this criteria easily, particularly as broadly applied. So I find the debate related to this criteria curious!

Where I would expect more debate is in the criteria "Effectiveness" and "Ethics". Effectiveness suggests that foundations should be supporting general operating dollars and multi-year initiatives; however, many foundations specifically exclude operating dollars from many of their funding streams. Ethics suggests that grantmakers should be open not just about their funding processes but about the impact of their investments--something foundations, like the organizations they fund--are still learning to do in a way that does not detract from direct service.

I'd love your thoughts on this report and its implications!

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By Leah

Greetings from my sabbatical! From Dec. 15-January 31, I am catching up on the mountain of "that looks interesting" reading that has been piling up on my desk for... years. My goal is to learn new approaches in planning, evaluation and research that our clients can benefit from.

Today I have been reading up on business strategies and reflecting on how these business strategies could be applied in the nonprofit and public sector. One article focused on scenarios as an alternative to forecasting. Because forecasts use previous trends to try to make predictions, they are very bad at accounting for major shifts or changes in the broader environment (which I'm sure anyone - including me - who has bought a house in the last four years can attest to...)

Scenarios use a number of factors in the current reality, and then think about what would happen if those factors were taken to greater or lesser extreme. For example, in our current reality, tax revenues, endowments and contributions are all down significantly. In the next several months, the declines may level off and we might see economic recovery as people look for buying opportunities, or the declines might continue worsening. A nonprofit or a public agency would then think about how to best position itself given those various scenarios. Does the nonprofit need to be prepared to take drastic measures? Does a public agency need to maintain as many programs as possible, potentially with some delayed spending?

Even before I started reading the article, I was listening to today's MPR Midmorning on Nonprofit Survival - and got to have the final comment of the hour! Essentially, the guests were trying to analyze where the "scenarios" were headed in the coming months. My comment was that I have observed nonprofits becoming increasingly savvy about evaluation over the last nine years, and feel they are better positioned in this downturn than in the past because they have valid, reliable and meaningful data with which to make decisions.

One of the benefits of sabbatical - not having to leave my house on this frigid day! Stay warm out there (you can ignore that part, California, South Carolina, Texas, Georgia and Florida friends!)

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On Dec. 12, 2007 a new executive order initiated a review of nearly every federal agency to determine:

1. If the agency targets were suitably outcome-oriented; and
2. If measures are appropriate for each target

The executive order classifies targets in three categories: (1) Long-term Measures: Program outcomes that fulfill the program’s purpose; (2) Annual Measures: Implementation of plans and efforts to achieve long-term and strategic goals; and (3) Efficiency Measures: Efforts to provide the most benefits (outcomes and outputs) for the taxpayer dollar spent.

The timeline of this review is very aggressive; each agency will be reviewed by February 22, with revised measures developed and adopted by June 30. What is interesting is the focus on reliability, validity and quality (see quote below) -- which align closely with the Guiding Principles for Evaluators.

From the Order:

The Government’s ability to determine a program’s effectiveness, and to direct attention to genuinely desired outcomes, is largely dependent upon the quality of the programs’ performance and efficiency goals, i.e., their measures and targets. PART goals aren’t always as outcome-oriented as they can be. We should continue to make PART program goals more outcome-oriented and aggressive as well as ensure measures are characterized correctly in PARTWeb.

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Hi friends and colleagues! We are wishing you a happy and wonderful Thanksgiving. I learned a new song at my daughter's "Special Person's Day" (I love Kindergarten) that sums up the joy of the holiday (sung to the tune of frere jacques):

Corn bread muffins
Chestnut stuffin'
Pumpkin pie
Two feet high
We were much thinner
Before we came to dinner
Me oh my, Me oh my

Enjoy the season -- and for those of you in Minnesota, enjoy the snow!

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Over the past year we have worked with Girl Scouts USA to evaluate the Uniquely ME! program, a program designed in 2002 to address low self-esteem, which is increasingly recognized as a problem facing young girls.

In our evaluation, we are focusing on the key components of girls' ability to "Discover, Connect, Take Action". Using a retrospective pre-test/post test model, we learned that the program has helped girls to take risks and try new things, confidently find their talents and find ways to make their lives better.

This initiative has been funded in large part by the Dove Self-esteem Fund, which recently prepared a short video called Onslaught demonstrating why this work is so necessary.

On a personal note, the importance of this work was made startlingly relevant to me a week ago when my five-year-old daughter informed me that I could buy a cream that would make my skin look as beautiful as hers. Needless to say, I was a little taken aback by the statement and her preoccupation with physical appearance! The troops in our area don't start until age 6, but we'll be looking forward to some of the lessons available from Girl Scouts.

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On a more personal note....

Like everyone we know, disappointment is something we at the Improve Group occasionally face. These disappointments can vary from wishing the results of an evaluation had more positive findings to wishing we were selected for a project.

Over the past few days I've been feeling disappointed about an interesting project that went to another evaluator (an aside: I think very highly of all my peers in the Twin Cities; that doesn't mean I don't have a competitive streak!) Today, driving home from a meeting and getting prepared for the days' tasks, I turned on Minnesota Public Radio and heard an interview with Rabbi Harold Kushner, author of Overcoming Life's Disappointments. The main message I got from the conversation was that everyone faces disappointment and that what disappointment teaches us is to learn, try things in a new or different way, and to feel proud that we can overcome obstacles. It was a great message to hear on a rainy, dismal day.

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On the lighter side...

Today was the third day of school in my school district (mandated by law to start after Labor Day in Minnesota). I knew several people with kindergarteners this year, both socially and professionally, so we exchanged a lot of phone calls and emails about how things went. Tuesday morning was accompanied by photos, nervousness (both parent and child), excitement (ditto) and what felt after a while like an interrogation "How did it go?" "Who did you meet?" "Was your teacher nice?" "Did you read anything? Do art? Go to the library?"

This morning, as we were getting everybody out of the door (shoes on, backpack packed, etc.) a haiku popped into my head:

3rd day of kindergarten

Amazingly, quickly
this momentous occasion
becomes a routine

I can't claim to be much of a poet!

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A while ago I blogged about qualitative and quantitative data, and promised a Dilbert comic when I received permission to use it. Well, here it is:

DILBERT: © Scott Adams/Dist. by United Feature Syndicate, Inc.

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A few years ago someone (I can't remember who it was to give them proper credit!) suggested that the National Association of State Boards of Education was a good resource for education data, information and legislation. I became a member and have been very pleased with the variety of information available on a range of topics from school improvement to nutrition in cafeterias.

The following was the content of a recent email titled "bill watch" - it listed all of the recent bills introduced in the U.S. Senate and House.

** Senate Bills Introduced **

S 1159 (Hagel, Nebraska) introduced the “IDEA Full Funding Act” to amend Part B of IDEA to provide full Federal funding of that part.
S 1167 (Harkin, Iowa) introduced the “Legal Aid Attorney Loan Repayment Act” to amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 in order to provide funding for student loan repayment for civil legal assistance attorneys.
S 1185 (Bingaman, New Mexico) introduced the “Graduation Promise Act of 2007” to provide grants to States to improve high schools and raise graduation rates while ensuring rigorous standards, to develop and implement effective school models for struggling students and dropouts, and to improve State policies to raise graduation rates. I think this is also co-sponsored by Senator Kennedy (Massachusetts).
S 1194 (Dodd, Connecticut) introduced the “No Child Left Behind Reform Act” to improve NCLB.
S 1199 (Wyden, Oregon) introduced the “Nanotechnology in the Schools Act” to strengthen the capacity of eligible institutions to provide instruction in nanotechnology.
S 1217 (Boxer, California) introduced to enhance the safety of elementary and secondary schools, and institutions of higher learning.
S 1228 (Durbin, Illinois) introduced the “Campus Law Enforcement Emergency Response Act of 2007” to amend Section 485(f) of the Higher Education Act of 1965 regarding law enforcement emergencies.
S 1231 (Reed, Rhode Island) introduced the “Preparing, Recruiting and Retaining of Education Professionals (PRREP) Act” to amend Part A of Title II of the Higher Education Act of 1965 to enhance teacher training and teacher preparation programs.
S 1232 (Dodd, Connecticut) introduced the “Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Management Act of 2007” to direct the Secretary of Health and Human Services in consultation with the Secretary of Education to develop voluntary policy managing the risk of food allergy and anaphylaxis in schools, to establish school-based food allergy management grants.
S 1236 (Murkowski, Alaska) introduced the “School Accountability Improvements Act” to amend the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 regarding highly qualified teachers, growth models, adequate yearly progress, Native American language programs, and parental involvement.
S 1241 (Grassley, Iowa) introduced to amend the IRS Code of 1986 to clarify student housing eligibility for the low-income housing credit.
S 176 (Clinton, New York) introduced this resolution congratulating charter schools and their students, parents, teachers and administrators across the U.S. for their ongoing contributions to education.
S 1261 (Cantwell, Washington) introduced the “Montgomery GI Bill for Life Act” to amend Title 10 and 38 of the US Code to repeal the 10-year limit on use of the Montgomery GI Bill’s educational assistance benefits.
S 1262 (Enzi, Wyoming) introduced the “Student Loan Accountability and Disclosure Reform Act” to protect students receiving student loans.
S 1278 (Hagel, Nebraska) introduced the “Veterans and Survivors Employment and Training Act of 2007” to amend Title 38, US Code, to expand the scope of programs and education for which accelerated payments of educational assistance under the Montgomery GI Bill may be used.
S 1294 (Durbin, Illinois) introduced the “Homeland Security Education Act” to strengthen national security by encouraging and assisting in the expansion and improvement of educational programs in order to meet critical needs at the elementary, secondary and postsecondary levels.
S 1302 (Kennedy, Massachusetts) introduced the “Keeping Parents and Communities Engaged [PACE] Act” to amend Title V of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 to encourage and support parent, family, and community involvement in schools; to provide needed integrated services and comprehensive supports to children; and to ensure that schools are centers of communities for the ultimate goal of assisting students to stay in school, become successful learners, and improve academic achievement.

** House Bills Introduced **
HR 1994 (McKeon, California) introduced to provide more transparency in the financial aid process and to ensure that students are receiving the best information about financial aid opportunities.
HR 2004 (Petri, Wisconsin) introduced the “Higher Education for Freedom Act” to establish and strengthen postsecondary education programs and courses in the subjects of traditional American history, free institutions, and Western civilization available to students preparing to teach these subjects and to other students.
HR 126 (Engel, New York) introduced supporting the goals and ideals of the Day of Silence with respect to discrimination and harassment faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals in schools.
HR 2017 (Holt, New Jersey) introduced to provide access and assistance to increase college attendance and completion of part-time students.
HR 2023 (Tancredo, Colorado) introduced to establish a student loan forgiveness program for members of the Sudanese Diaspora to enable them to return to southern Sudan and contribute to the reconstruction effort of southern Sudan.
HR 334 (Miller, North Carolina) introduced a resolution supporting the goals and ideals of National Community College Month.
HR 2063 (Lowey, New York) introduced to direct the to direct the Secretary of Health and Human Services in consultation with the Secretary of Education to develop voluntary policy managing the risk of food allergy and anaphylaxis in schools, to establish school-based food allergy management grants.
HR 2070 (Udall, Colorado) introduced to amend Part A of Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 regarding adequate yearly progress and assessments.
HR 2073 (Kennedy, Rhode Island) introduced to increase the number of well-trained mental health service professionals, including those in schools, who provide clinical mental health care to children and adolescents.
HR 344 (Boustany, Louisiana) introduced this resolution congratulating charter schools and their students, parents, teachers and administrators across the U.S. for their ongoing contributions to education.
HR 2087 (DeLauro, Connecticut) introduced to improve the “No Child Left Behind Act of 2001.”
HR 2111 (Holt, New Jersey) introduced to amend the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 to establish a partnership program in foreign languages.

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Last Thursday (July 19) we launched our new workshop series. In a session on developing good outcome indicators and tools, and another on how to conduct an evaluation as an internal evaluator, participants walked through the different stages of an evaluation and developed their own materials to use in their work. They learned how to create good surveys and focus groups, develop a logic model, and use evaluation to tell their organizations story. The picture below shows one activity in which participants used a road map to describe their evaluation goals.

Our participants said:

My learning goals were to understand the greater evaluation process and purpose, beyond just reporting what funders require – definitely met my goals!
I feel I have a much better base of knowledge in evaluation and will be using this info to improve our processes at our organization.
I learned specific logistical details about conducting evaluations.
My goals were to understanding data collection mechanisms, interpret outcome data and learn about the elements of an evaluation – all of these were met.

We will next be offering our workshops in September. If you are interested in registering, please let us know through our contact form and we will send you additional information.

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Are you the kind of person who loves a good story and can instantly think about how that experience might relate to other people? Or do you really enjoy seeing a chart or a table and thinking about how all the different numbers explain an issue?

Stories, videos, pictures, recordings all can provide valuable information -- and evaluators usually lump them together in the category "qualitative data". Charts, tables, percentages are equally valuable and usually lumped together as "quantitative data".

We usually use both types of data when helping our clients understand the outcomes or results of a program. While both presents interesting information, using them together provides us with a greater depth of understanding about what happened when someone tried a new program.

Yesterday someone asked me "How do you get someone to see the value of qualitative data?" and this was probably the tenth time I've been asked this question. Some people are just going to want hard numbers and that quantitative data is the best way to get at the truth of a situation. I don't dispute that numbers are great, but you can't guarantee that everyone is going to respond to them.

One way to make qualitative data more responsive to a number-phile is to present both types of information side-by-side. For example, you may have a chart on the left-hand side of a page, with relevant quotes on the right-hand side. (By the way, when I was checking to make sure "phile" was the right suffix to use, I found a number of great resources: the Columbia Guide to Standard American English, the suffix entry at Wikipedia, and the Vocabulary Workshop for people preparing for an American University with its extensive discussion on suffixes. There was also a nice list at http://www.michigan-proficiency-exams.com/suffix-list.html, but it didn't include "phile")

Another way to present qualitative data to those who prefer numbers is to convert stories to numbers. For example, you might do a focus group or two and learn that several people have enjoyed a specific social experiences through a program or organization. You could then design a survey for more people to find out if they similarly enjoyed the social aspect of a program, using some sort of scale. We used this approach in our work with United Jewish Fund and Council, in which we first explored some issues through focus groups and then conducted a larger community survey.

There is a related Dilbert cartoon; I am waiting for permission to publish it.

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by Leah

I want to sincerely congratulate John Bryson on his recent receipt of the McKnight Presidential endowed professorship. Prof. Bryson taught me a great deal when I was a student at the Humphrey Institute, including to have fun when working complex issues involving a lot of players with divergent interests. Dean Atwood asked if I would write a letter about Prof. Bryson for his nomination for a faculty award. In my letter, I said (among other things):

"I particularly enjoyed learning from Professor Bryson’s broad view of stakeholders and their importance in strategic planning initiatives. He had an intuitive understanding of how stakeholder engagement can strengthen a strategic planning process by ensuring goals are broadly based in the current context, building support for resulting strategies and ensuring a level of accountability for the benchmarks or outcomes set in the process. This lesson in particular has stayed with me in my professional years; stakeholder engagement is one of the areas I emphasize in my own professional work and continue to search for creative ways of building those relationships between organizations and their stakeholders... "

“Because I learned so much from Professor Bryson, I am truly grateful to have the opportunity to support him for the Regents Professorship. I owe much of the philosophy that underlies my work to his teaching.”

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In previous blogs I've mentioned our work for the MN Department of Human Services evaluating the Home and Community Based waiver programs (see The fun of data collection, Thank you for visiting us!, and Technology possibilities and barriers among others). One of the great aspects of the project is visiting and learning about communities across Minnesota (you can see a list of completed reviews here, and several others are in process). Last week, four of our staff (Leah, Eric, Elizabeth and Collin) traveled to southwestern Minnesota to visit Lincoln, Lyon, Murray and Yellow Medicine counties. Not only did we enjoy beautiful (if windy) sunny days during our trip, but I had the chance to visit my grandparent's house (see the picture) and my uncle, Lyon County Judge George Harrelson.

Traveling for work can be challenging (long days on the road, being away from home and family), but our staff have found some ways to make it enjoyable.

First, since we tend to travel in a group, we have introduced some rituals. At least once during our trip we make an evening outing to Dairy Queen, and have fun comparing each one we visit.

Second, we find ways to act as tourists even though we are traveling on business. Liz has a book of sites to see in Minnesota, and we get to some out-of-the-way places. We also try to visit local restaurants as much as possible and ask the program staff for recommendations.

Third, while we work long days, we also have downtime during each visit, including walks (if it is nice out) or visits to casinos (which have the best accommodations in some communities).

Even though we are glad to get home after each trip, our staff have really enjoyed our travels around the state (and country).

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As members of the American Evaluation Association we were recently asked to submit nominations for annual awards, including the Marcia Guttentag award for evaluators in their first five years in the profession. After reviewing the criteria, we knew Becky exemplified the criteria:

* Promise will have been demonstrated in early notable and substantial accomplishments.
* Contributions may include evidence of early involvement in professional activities and successful leadership.
* Contributions should have extended beyond the accomplishment of one or two evaluations of quality.

As part of our nomination of Becky, we got to ask some of our clients for recommendations. It was a delight to read their kind words:

Though Ms. Stewart began evaluating our project in January, her impact on our
evaluation processes has been profound. She helped us clarify our project objectives and improve the
alignment of our evaluation instruments with the newly refined objectives... Becky’s commitment to developing shared understandings of our project goals and measures has meant that each facilitator’s point of view and understanding has been engaged - Byron Richard, Perpich Center for Arts Education

Rebecca's biggest strength is reflecting the principle of responsibilties for the general and public welfare. Not only does she take into account the diversity of interests and values related to the general and public welfare in Northwestern Minnesota, she very much leads by example. She continually focuses on sound evaluation methods, a solid partnership approach and providing information and results that help us inform our partnership and improve our overall service delivery. - Colleen MacRae, Project Director, Stephen-Argyle Safe Schools Initiative

We are all rooting for you, Becky!

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A few weeks ago I wrote about evaluating programs designed to solve problems. In the blog I discussed logic models and how they can be used to understand a program, its activities and intended outcomes.

Shortly after writing the blog, the U.S. congress began exploring how to define outcomes for the war in Iraq. Setting aside opinions about the war, I found the debate fascinating, particularly because I had just been musing about logic models and how they help me think through problems. Could a logic model be used to define goals, activities and outcomes for the war? Could developing a logic model help two seemingly incompatible points of view come to agreement about the next steps for the war? Is a progress report a good way of measuring the success of the war?

Although clearly foreign policy in general and wars in particular are complicated by the unknown responses and actions of other players, I couldn’t help but begin diagramming my questions into a logic model.

I guess I am not immune to seeing things through the lens of my discipline!

I mentioned our work with Safe Schools/Healthy Students grantees in Spring Lake Park, Northwestern Minnesota, and a cross-site research project for most of Minnesota's grantees before. In the recently released RFP for new grants, applicants are required to submit a logic model of their program. Although competition this year is expected to be very strong (there will likely be close to 500 applicants for approximately 20-30 funded grants), a strong logic model can help guide the rest of the grant narrative. This approach worked for Performing Arts Workshop when applying for their U.S. Department of Education Arts in Education Model Development and Dissemination grant; they were able to include input from schools, artists and program staff in the goals, outcomes and measures for their ARISE project. Please feel free to contact us to talk about developing a logic model for a grant application.

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When reading the newspaper or browsing the internet I tend to be drawn to articles in which someone is developing a solution to a widespread (or at least widely talked about) problem.

Recent stories that come to mind focused on faith-based financial education as a way to help individuals increase financial discipline, the recent announcement by the Broad and Gates foundations of a major investment in increasing the American dialog for education (and ultimately to ensure more students go on to postsecondary education) and the large investment by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to fight childhood obesity.

These stories interest me because I am fascinated with how people define problems or needs and then develop strategies to solve them. In our work with clients we often use an approach called logic modeling. (You can find somewhat academic background articles about logic models here and here). When we first suggest developing a logic model to a client, we try to emphasize that it isn't an intimidating process, although it can take considerable time and effort to get it right. We describe logic models as a simple, visual way to describe (1) what you hope to accomplish, (2) who or what is expected to change, (3) through what efforts and (4) why the effort is important. They can take many forms; we recently created a bulls eye-shaped logic model for City House that started out as a diagram of a person; another logic model of collaboration (see a blog about our presentation to Minnesota Superintendents) took a much more traditional flow-chart format.

Logic models get tweaked periodically as the environment and programs evolved. For example, in our Safe Schools/Healthy Students evaluation work with Spring Lake Park District 16 over a 4-year period, we revisited the logic model twice, with the final version most strongly representing the unique characteristics of the districts in the context of the federal program.

When I hear of new initiatives, abbreviated logic models are the easiest way for me to understand what is happening. Sometimes before I realize it, I have created a mental diagram of the changes a program is expecting and through what initiatives. I am not sure if this is common to other people who do evaluation work, but is the primary frame for the way I look at private and public efforts to improve the public good.

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A few years ago, I looked into newspaper clipping services as a way of staying informed about topics of interest to me and my clients. I wanted an easy way to scan multiple sources of information without having to read dozens of newspapers, magazines and journals. However, I found most clipping services at the time to be cumbersome and difficult to use, with paper rather than email-based summaries. They were also fairly expensive for what I hoped to do.

I did find one resource that I liked called the MovingIdeas network. This site had an RSS feed that I could have published on our website. The articles that fed into the RSS had a decidedly progressive slant, although most had very detailed and valuable information about public policy, budget issues, education and health care compiled from a variety of sources. I continue to visit the site, although I no longer subscribe to the feed.

Recently I began using a newer resource, Google Alerts. This service basically performs a Google search at desired intervals (continuously, daily or weekly) and emails the search results. The search can be confined to news, blogs, groups or be comprehensive. I started a weekly search for news related to Safe Schools/Healthy Students (SSHS), as we've worked with a number of SSHS grantees and are anticipating a new SSHS grant to be released shortly. The weekly results are very interesting; today there were stories on a school uniform initiative promoted through an SSHS grant; a story on a recent shigella outbreak (which my son had a few months ago - yuck!); and a story on the limits of legal options around mental health services from the New York Times.

All staff members have also created their own alerts to monitor their areas of interest. It's led to some additional discussion within the office, about topics ranging from the most recent research on childcare to the latest gadgets available for analysis.

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One of the things that may have triggered my interest in research and evaluation is my participation in the Youth Development Study. Starting at age 17, as a senior in high school, I began participating in this annual survey of education, work experiences, civic activity, general well-being, and family life. This study continues to this day, and has resulted in four books, 77 academic papers, and numerous dissertations. From the time I first began participating in the study, I was interested in how the questions were worded, why I was selected, and why they wanted to know three people who may be able to find me as I moved. I was also curious about the incentive - starting at $10 in the first years and gradually increasing (I believe I get $25 each year now). Most of all, I have been interested in the results of the study -- which have been much harder to come by. When I was selected for a sub-group of follow-up questions three years ago, I began probing the interviewer about study results and trends. This year, the University of Minnesota's Department of Sociology provided participants with a newsletter. Some highlights:

1. In 17 years, the study has had an attrition rate of about 31%.
2. More than 2/3 of study participants are married or cohabitating
3. 20% of women and 12% of men were not working at ages 30-31 - which is a slight increase from when the cohort as a group was aged 24-25
4. Income for the 30-31 cohort increased significantly from when they were aged 24-25, with household incomes increasing from $19,000 to $55,000.

I continue to be fascinated by this data set, and more than a little interested in what others in my age group are doing. The most recent publication from the data is:

"Career Beginnings American Style: Agency and Floundering in Subjective Perspective." Jeylan T. Mortimer and Laura Fischer. In Inside the Frontiers of Adulthood: How Young Adults Understand and Navigate Their Lives. Research Network on Transitions to Adulthood Qualitative Study Cross-Site Volume, edited by Teresa Toguchi Swartz, Douglas Hartmann, and Ruben Rumbaut. Forthcoming. 3rd Annual Conference on Emerging Adulthood, February 15-16, 2007, Tucson.

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My weekly email from www.edweek.org announced that all of their statistics and data will be accessible over the next several weeks; their is a lot available on their website if school-based research interests you. Here is the full announcement:

The doors to edweek.org – your source for the best information on K-12 education – will be wide open from March 19th (that’s TODAY) until April 15th. So while you are enjoying your Spring Break, come enjoy ours at www.edweek.org and see everything premium subscribers see every day.

You won’t want to miss any of this valuable K-12 information, including:

· current issue of Education Week, plus daily updates and web-only stories

· 25 years of archives, perfect for researching issues of importance to you

· all issues of Teacher Magazine

· all of the special reports – Quality Counts, Technology Counts and Diplomas Count – from the Research Center

· The Daily News, with updates from across the country

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Collaboration is receiving increasing visibility in recent years; funders are requiring collaboration as a way to ensure services are not duplicated and address complex problems while local community agencies see collaboration as a way to broaden their reach.

Last fall we concluded fifteen months of original research into collaboration in five Minnesota communities. These communities were recipients of the federal Safe Schools/Healthy Students grant, and had school district, law enforcement and mental health partners. We had the opportunity to present lessons learned at the Minnesota Association of School Administrator's conference on Friday, March 15. Chief among our findings, and one that participants most related to, is that collaboration may take longer than "going it alone", but there is much greater potential for systemic change when working with a broad base of support. Similarly, it is important that a structure is well-defined, as are a broad vision and goals, but that individual partners have the opportunity to shape the specific steps.

See a .pdf version of our presentation here.

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Several of the arts educators we work with have mentioned over the years that No Child Left Behind (NCLB) was the first time the arts were recognized as one of five core subject areas (including in a recent interview of Perpich Center for Arts Education's Mike Hiatt). However, in a review of NCLB documents from the U.S. Department of Education, very few list core subject areas, and when they do, there are more than five core areas listed. The documents that refer to core academic ares indicate subjects in which teachers must be qualified, and these include English, reading or language arts, mathematics, science, foreign languages, civics and government, economics, arts, history, and geography.

Furthermore, some documents from the U.S. Department of Education suggest that the artse are viewed more as an enhancement than as a core subject. These include a letter from the Acting Assistant Secretary Ronald Tomalis, in which all arts activities not considered to be "the music" or "the arts" class are considered enhancements. This allows flexibility for schools in providing the arts (including bringing in artists as paraprofessionals into the classroom, the model used by another of our clients, Performing Arts Workshop), but also leads to challenges in truly integrating the arts as a core academic area.

A final weakness is that of the core subjects, only reading and math have assessment requirements, with science to be added in the coming year. States are required to test students in reading and math, and also subject themselves to peer review around reading and math implementation.

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According to W. Paul Farmer, Executive Director of the American Planning Association, the current federal budget proposal from President Bush could have very large impacts on communities, particularly in the long term. The single biggest targets for cuts and disinvestment are community development and infrastructure. Most of the major federal programs that planners use for significant community investment are cut: Community Development Block Grants (CDBG; cut by $1.2 billion), Clean Water State Revolving Fund (CWSRF; cut by $400 million), Land and Water Conservation Fund (zero funding), HOPE VI (zero funding), and transit (cut by $300 million). Transit also loses some of the guarantees it has received in previous budgets, and the EPA's Smart Growth office is targeted for major personnel cuts.

These cuts are "backloaded", meaning they gradually increase over time. For example, an analysis by CBPP shows that for community development programs, a 25 percent cut in 2009 grows to more than 30 percent by 2012 (not adjusting for inflation). Environmental programs would see an 8 percent cut this year nearly double to 15.7 percent in 2012.

Locally in Minnesota, there are concerns that planned increases in transportation funding are being negated by something most people would consider a good thing -- conservation. A recent analysis expects gas tax receipts in Minnesota to have lower-than-expected increases (with eventual decreases), primarily thanks to better fuel efficiency in most cars that are popular today.

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A recent article in Planning, the magazine of the American Planning Association, talks about how local communities are responding to rapid population growth. In Florida (where I lived for several months), school enrollment increases by nearly 50,000 students each year. To keep up with demand, districts increasingly built large schools on vacant plots of land at the edge of neighborhoods, rather than integrating schools into neighborhoods--56 new schools were built in Florida in 2000 alone.

A 2002 law required closer coordination between school districts and county planners. The results have so far been limited; coordination is evidenced by a single document signed by each party that a school site is acceptable. However, increasing constraints on public investments may force more coordinaion, as in the case of shared school site and rec center facilities (sharing fields and a gym, for example).

It will be interesting to watch whether increasing requirements for collaboration will result in actual collaborative advantage; in other words, districts and planners finding ways to accomplish their goals more efficiently and with better results than if they were working independently.

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I can't resist a quick congratulations to my cousin, Rachel Grady, and her partner Heidi Ewing on the nomination of their documentary Jesus Camp for an Academy Award. It was a film many of us in the office watched and discussed for weeks after its local release at Lagoon Cinema.

Can't wait to see them on the red carpet!

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A recent story on Marketplace/NPR caught my attention. Prof. Joel Fleishman of Duke University finds fault with foundations in his most recent book The Foundation: A Great American Secret; How Private Wealth is Changing the World. He says that he studied dozens of foundations including the size of the sector, but very few publish results in a way that can help either non-profits or other foundations learn and become more effective.

This is an interesting aspect of the issue recently addressed in the New York Times magazine by economist Peter Singer, who argued for a sliding scale of giving with those with the most means giving the highest proportion of their wealth away. He too noted the limited accountability built into private donations, and that perhaps a taxation system with a more widely distributed decision-making power was necessary. It is an interesting argument; how do you encourage people to do good, if you take the definition of good out of their control?

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In 1964, at the age of 35, Martin Luther King Jr. became the youngest person every to win the Nobel Peace Prize. His accomplishments leading up to that award were nothing short of amazing; as a (fairly recent) graduate student I quickly subtracted his start date from the completion date of his doctorate -- a time when he was also starting a family -- and came up with two short years.

I can't summarize Dr. King's legacy for America, but I am struck by two aspects of his vision that I think provide the foundation of what many think of basic human morality today. The first aspect is the concept of the dignity and value of all human kind. Racial justice was the most prominent aspect of this vision, but he extended the vision to all humans, disadvantaged and advantaged alike. This was clear in his recently released speech, where he emphasized how justice, dignity and value have been ideals strived for in all areas, and linked various philosophers with different political views to this concept.

We are all moving, in some sense, towards a promised land...justice peace and brotherhood are the promised land.

The second aspect is that, in turn, acting non-violently is the highest form of human dignity. This, clearly, is the root of his Nobel Prize acceptance speech:

...This award which I receive on behalf of that movement is a profound recognition that nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time - - the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression. Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts.

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What if....

You could hold a focus group that people could attend from all over the country?

You could have in-person meetings with your colleagues, even when they are in different locations?

You could have a brainstorming session that resulted in a "demo" product or description right on-site?

There has been technology trying to enable these items for a number of years. In Minnesota, our state provides an ITV system to all counties, public 2- to 4-year colleges, and many other local community centers. We are working with the Dept. of Human Services next week to host an ITV workshop on our waiver review project with counties that have already been reviewed; we will use the session to ask them how counties are using results and whether there are other aspects of services we should be evaluating.

Another client, Austin Public Schools, uses a web meeting format; they joked at a recent in-person meeting that soon they will never have to leave their desks. However, they shortly began to tell us where all the local restaurants are, and it sounds like there will be plenty of incentives for a long time to get together in person over food including the Tendermaid where we had lunch.

One complaint about each of these formats is that they can be awkward for new users. A recent article in the New York Times suggests a different format: games. The article describes several courses that are currently being "hosted" in an environment on the game Second Life. It will be interesting how people, particularly young adults, savvy with this format demand more and more of the flexibility it allows to be integrated in their work environment.

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This week, I missed a significant amount of work to be home with my kids, both of whom were sick. Because this week I happened to have deadlines, I did some work from home in the evenings and when the kids were occupied, so probably worked a total of 25 hours (as opposed to my typical 40) this week.

It made me wonder if anyone has studied the economic costs of caring for ill children. I thought epidemiologists, economists, particularly those interested in labor markets, and policy makers might be interested in the issue.

I found a few articles related to chronic or severe long-term illnesses and disabilities. Several articles, on the other hand, tried to quantify the economic benefit of vaccinating children against the flu.

One study found a $4 positive benefit of the flu vaccine per child, and a $35 positive benefit per child if everyone in a group setting like daycare was vaccinated. The study used very interesting assumptions, including about participation rates in the workforce and likely family behavior (they assumed it would always be a female caregiver who stayed home with an ill child).

In addition to finding a positive financial benefit, the study indicated that if the flu vaccine is found to also prevent ear infections (an issue I am personally interested in!) the financial benefit would go way up.

Just a little bit of musing as we head into the weekend. I hope everyone here in Minnesota has a chance to enjoy the slightly warmer weather.

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