Moldow Erika, Anderson Virgie M, Benjamin Stephanie LaShay, Johnson Barbara Patricia, McGuan Elizabeth, Xenakis Donna, Shields Alexandra Piñeros, Xu Yanfeng
Elm Consulting, LLC, Denver, CO, USA.
HALOS, Charleston, SC, USA.
Res Involv Engagem. 2023 Sep 11;9(1):82. doi: 10.1186/s40900-023-00487-6.
Approximately one in ten children globally live with kinship caregivers-relatives and family friends who step in to care for a child when parents are unable to do so. When families take on the role of informal kinship care-care of a child outside of the child welfare system-they often do so without financial assistance and advice in navigating the systems of support available to them. This is the unique role of kinship navigator programs in the U.S: to provide kinship caregivers a single point of entry for connecting to needed resources such as financial, health, housing, and legal assistance.
To the best of our knowledge, our team conducted one of the only participatory evaluations in which kinship caregivers were involved in all stages of evaluating a kinship navigator program-from designing the questions, to collecting and analyzing the data, to reporting the results. Black kinship caregivers took on decision-making power leading this formative evaluation of a kinship navigator program within one nonprofit organization in a Southeastern state.
In this paper we reflect on our process and offer lessons learned from engaging in participatory evaluation that may apply to the field of kinship care and across social service delivery more broadly. We focus on (1) ensuring the nonprofit's commitment to the study, (2) maintaining engagement through building relationships and facilitating a culture of learning within the study team, (3) sharing decision-making power so that people with lived experience have the authority and ownership to lead the evaluation, (4) developing team members' skills, confidence, and sense of belonging, and (5) increasing the likelihood the nonprofit will act on the study findings.
Through this process, we learned that participatory evaluation is a feasible and useful approach both to understanding the experiences of kinship families and to improving the supports in their lives. We hope this paper will inspire others to draw on the strengths and capacity of people with lived experience to engage in participatory evaluation. Greater recognition of the value of this approach in social change and increased funding to carry out the process are both needed.
全球约十分之一的儿童与亲属照料者生活在一起，亲属照料者是指在父母无法照顾孩子时介入照顾孩子的亲属和家庭朋友。当家庭承担起非正式亲属照料的角色，即在儿童福利系统之外照顾孩子时，他们往往在没有经济援助以及缺乏如何利用现有支持系统建议的情况下这样做。这就是美国亲属导航项目的独特作用：为亲属照料者提供一个单一的接入点，以便他们连接到所需资源，如经济援助、医疗保健、住房和法律援助。
据我们所知，我们的团队开展了为数不多的参与式评估之一，在这个评估中，亲属照料者参与了评估亲属导航项目的各个阶段，从设计问题、收集和分析数据到报告结果。黑人亲属照料者在东南部一个州的一家非营利组织内，对一个亲属导航项目进行形成性评估时拥有决策权。
在本文中，我们反思了我们的评估过程，并分享了从参与式评估中吸取的经验教训，这些经验教训可能适用于亲属照料领域以及更广泛的社会服务提供领域。我们重点关注以下几点：（1）确保非营利组织对该研究的承诺；（2）通过建立关系和在研究团队中营造学习文化来保持参与度；（3）分享决策权，以便有实际生活经验的人有权限和自主权来主导评估；（4）培养团队成员的技能、信心和归属感；（5）增加非营利组织根据研究结果采取行动的可能性。
通过这个过程，我们了解到参与式评估是一种既可行又有用的方法，既能了解亲属家庭的经历，又能改善他们生活中的支持。我们希望本文能激励其他人利用有实际生活经验者的优势和能力来参与参与式评估。需要更广泛地认识到这种方法在社会变革中的价值，并增加开展该过程的资金投入。
