Evaluating Evidence Uptake of a Regional Program for Violence Prevention

• In Event: Highlighted Session: Global Evidence to Local Action in Central America: Understanding, localizing, and using evidence on education’s role in preventing violence

Proposal

A partnership network focusing on evidence-based advocacy developed out of a USAID-funded project, led by a partnership with a university and NGO, that enabled civil society organizations and research institutions in the Northern Triangle to produce reliable and accurate data by employing state-of-the-art data analysis techniques to inform human rights and democracy policy. With more than 15 institutional affiliations, currently the network focuses on building research partnerships based on solidarity, evidence-based advocacy, capacity strengthening, and accompaniment that bring together humanitarianism, poverty and inequality, and effective states. The network’s research approach is collaborative to build on and support current partnerships and faculty expertise in the region and is unique in its focus on both macro systemic issues and micro individual flourishing. In the session, the network will present its approach to conducting collaborative research and leveraging the voices of Central American researchers both regionally and in the U.S, drawing from its current experiences working with both US and Central America-based universities, and other local partners to evaluate the impact of a US Department of State-funded program in Central America, implemented by local police in primary and intermediate schools. Sharing key highlights of the evaluation, the network’s experience in this evaluation demonstrates the need to rely on local expertise and to understand the local context to choose the most effective methodologies, avoid biases, and interpret and communicate results in a way that equitably reflect different groups.

Author

• Maria Estela Rivero Fuentes, University of Notre Dame