Research and Evaluation

"The Center for Community Support and Research plays an important role in Wichita State University's Urban-serving Research Mission by linking the university to partners in the region and helping us to integrate into our community in ways that have a positive effect and a tangible outcome."

J. David McDonald PhD, Associate Provost for Research
Wichita State University

Want to determine whether your program or initiative is on the right track and makes a difference for those you serve? The Center for Community Support & Research (CCSR) Research and Evaluation team can assist you with a wide range of research and evaluation services to help you accomplish this goal. CCSR uses a participatory approach in which we consider the organizations with which we work our partners in designing research and evaluation projects. This approach ensures that we're responsive to the needs of the organization while implementing high quality research and evaluations. With the techniques and expertise that we've developed in our 25 years of practice, CCSR can help identify where programs are effectively meeting their goals, and where course correction may be needed.

Why is Research and Evaluation important?

The success of a program is not just a numbers game. A program can serve a large number of individuals, but still be ineffective in terms of sustainable change. CCSR's Research and Evaluation team looks at the actual need for programs, impact on recipients and resulting changes created in their lives – while also evaluating how programs achieve these results. More and more funders require such evaluation...and organizations and communities gain evidence that they are truly helping those they serve.

What CCSR Research and Evaluation Services can do for you:

• Measure the persistence of a social problem and the need for services through needs, asset, resource, and/or gap assessments.
• Assist organizations in connecting activities to outcomes through outcome-based planning and logic model development.
• Identify how well programs have been implemented through process and fidelity assessments.
• Assess the effectiveness of programs in achieving intended goals and making a difference for service recipients through outcome evaluations.
• Analyze the ability of organizations to provide effective services and sustain their efforts through organizational capacity assessments.
• Utilize well-respected and innovative techniques and tools such as:
  • Archival data compilation and analysis
  • Arts-based participatory action research such as Photovoice
  • Empowerment evaluation
  • Focus group design and facilitation
  • Key informant interview design and administration
  • Survey development and administration (including online and phone surveys)
  • Other qualitative and quantitative research and evaluation approaches such as community mapping, social network mapping, concept mapping, environmental scan, etc.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, contact:
Tara Gregory, PhD
tara.gregory@wichita.edu
316.978.3714 direct
1.800.445.0116
316.978.3843 office

View CCSR's recent Research & Publications