ORE Newsletter: 2018 Community Conversations Research Grant Awardees, Education Evidence Brief, and Website Makeover

AmeriCorps sent this bulletin at 12/04/2018 09:00 AM EST

Announcing the 2018 Community Conversations Research Grant Competition Awardees

The Office of Research & Evaluation (ORE) hosts a research competition for institutions of higher education to advance scholarship on civic engagement, social capital, volunteering, and national service. These studies and findings serve to foster civic engagement and strengthen communities, both of which are central to the mission of the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS).

We are pleased to announce that ORE awarded its third cohort of grants for 2018, listed below. These grantees are university researchers who are working with community partners to conduct participatory research in local communities. Together they will be investigating a community-identified issue and develop action plans. In addition, they will build relationships with other community stakeholders and increase civic engagement to find solutions and strengthen community. Our new grantees and their community partners are working on an array of issues within the CNCS focus areas (economic opportunity, education, disaster services and environmental stewardship, and healthy futures). 

NCCC and VISTA have also contributed funds towards the awards and will be working with ORE and the grantees to connect national service members and programs to the communities.  

Congratulations to our new awardees and to our 2017 grantees on their second year awards! We are excited about continuing to build new partnerships with universities and communities. See our research grantee profiles for a more detailed description of our 2015 and 2017 university grantees.

2018 Evidence-based Planning Grant Awards

The AmeriCorps Grant Competition awards evidence-based intervention planning grants to organizations that develop new national service models seeking to integrate members into innovative evidence-based interventions. These grants are funded through CNCS’ ORE, which helps grantees design their evaluation plans, in addition to the support they already receive through the AmeriCorps Program Office.

This year, ORE is pleased to award evidence-based intervention planning grants to the following grantees:

  • University of Wyoming
  • Florida Department of Elder Affairs – Elderserve
  • Campus Compact Mid-Atlantic

We are excited to see how these grantees develop national service programs with a focus on evidence and evaluation. To learn more about the progress that last year’s grantees have made, check out the first and second posts in our blog series on the CNCS Tumblr.  

Class is in Session: The Education Evidence Brief

As the leading federal agency and largest grant maker for service and volunteering in the United States, CNCS helps millions of Americans through sustained investments in students, schools, parents, teachers, and communities across the country. CNCS-supported, education-focused programs have produced favorable and measured outcomes in the areas of kindergarten and school readiness, improved socioemotional skills, emergent literacy skills, and improved reading and math achievement, among many others. Further, these programs serve low-income, low-performing, and at-risk target groups with diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds in communities across the nation.

Check out ORE’s new report brief, Effective CNCS-Funded Education Programs, to see how CNCS-funded interventions and national service programs are making a big impact in the education field.

Digging for Data: 2018 National Senior Corps Convening Recap

At the 2018 Senior Corps Convening in July, the Office of Research & Evaluation (ORE) hosted the “Data Dig,” an interactive display which featured interactive presentation boards highlighting key findings from a forthcoming Senior Corps report. Attendees shared their thoughts and reactions to the research, which ORE addressed at a plenary session the following day. The Data Dig was a big success, and we look forward to finding more interactive ways for you to engage with our research at future events!

Be sure to watch for the release of the Senior Corps research, slated for early 2019.

What’s New on the Evidence Exchange

Check out some of the new resources added to the Evidence Exchange:

Top Downloads:

Contents

Teach Me Your Ways - Check Out the Evaluation TA Portal

Did you know that CNCS offers a free evaluation technical assistance (TA) portal? All competitively funded AmeriCorps State and National grantees and state commission grantees can register to access the portal. The TA Portal enables grantees and subgrantees to submit requests for evaluation TA support to address a variety of needs, including evaluation design, implementation, and reporting.

Check out the TA Portal to see how we can help you with your evaluation needs, whether it’s a consultation, connecting with a topic-area expert, providing document review, or evaluator-to-evaluator technical consultation.

Website Makeover: National Service Success by the Numbers

CNCS’ website has a new and improved look! Now featured on the Our Impact section of the website, the redesigned ORE webpage has all of our latest updates, research, and resources in one, easily-accessible location. See for yourself the success of national service by the numbers, and let us know what you think of the new look at evaluation@cns.gov.

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