Evaluation – Theory and Practice Regina McGoff, business development coordinator, Extension Center for Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources Description: learn about evaluation theory and applicable examples for Master Gardener programs. Regina McGoff, business development coordinator for the Extension Center for Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources, will give a quick overview of how to structure an evaluation of your program. Lynne Hagen, Master Gardener Program Coordinator-Anoka County, will give concrete examples of how she has structured evaluations in creative and different ways that could be applied to your Master Gardener programs. may 4, 2017 © Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved..

Where do you start? 1. What do you/your stakeholders want to know? 2. How will you measure this? 3. How will you use this data? BEFORE you start collecting data, get clear on what information will be useful to you and to your stakeholders. Design your evaluation to meet both of your needs Don’t collect information that will not be used! © 2010 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.

different evaluation purposes I want to know ….about my program’s audience. ….if my program should continue. ….if participants learned what I intended in the program. ….if my program has any long term impact. ….how I can improve my program.

Common evaluation areas: Outputs # of events, activities, products # of participants and demographic info on participants Outcomes learning gains and behavior changes Success Stories stories that illustrate why your outputs and outcomes are important Think about how you can use evaluation to show the impact of your programs. Focus on 1 or 2 things that you can demonstrate well rather than trying to get impact for everything you do. © 2016 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.

Impact What social, environmental and economic conditions change? How will others in the community benefit who don’t directly participate in the programs? How will others in the community benefit who don’t directly participate in the programs? Impact is the gold standard of evaluation but often the hardest thing to measure. Know your outcomes and impacts from your logic model. © 2016 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.

A public value message: When you support ______________program, participants will ____________________, (changes) which leads to ______________________, (outcomes) which will benefit other community members by __________________________________. (public value/impact) Pollinator example: When you support Master Gardener Flowers for Pollinators programs, participants will learn about pollinators and the threats they face, which leads to people create pollinator-friendly habitats in their communities, which benefits other community members by maintaining plant diversity and protecting food crop production. University of Minnesota Extension: Kalambokidis

Pollinator example: When you support the Master Gardener Flowers for Pollinator programs, participants will learn about pollinators and the threats they face, which leads to people creating pollinator-friendly habitats, which will benefit other community members by maintaining plant diversity and protecting food crop production. Proving this is a whole other thing but at least can guide you in the right direction! University of Minnesota Extension: Kalambokidis

How can you prove that? Did participants learn about pollinators and the threats they face? Did people create pollinator-friendly habitats? Did the community maintain plant diversity? Did the community protect food crop production? Did populations of native and honey bees stay the same or increase? Did people appropriately use pesticides in their communities?

Possible methods Surveys Testing (pre and post to test knowledge gain) Interviews and Focus groups Observation Document review DON’T just default to doing a survey. Survey after the class to see what they intend to do, then at the end of the growing season to see what they did Pre- and post-test to show learning gains Interviews or focus groups with community members or class participants to see what behavior changes they made Observation – bee counts in the community before and after education efforts Review of county documents related to fertilizer purchases, plant production, etc. © 2016 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.

Examples from other states Colorado Master Gardener Impacts In 2016, thirty-four Colorado counties participated in the Colorado Master Gardener volunteer program. A statewide total of 1408 Colorado Master Gardeners volunteered 53,561 hours to their Colorado communities, engaging 131,307 citizens. Colorado Master Gardener support is invaluable to horticulture extension programs. Based on the 2015 figure from the Independent Sector’s Value of Volunteer Time, ($25.96/hour for Colorado), our volunteers donated nearly $1.4 million dollars to Colorado! http://cmg.colostate.edu/impact.shtml I thought that it would be helpful to look at some examples from other states of how they identify the impact of their programs. Common output indicators as well as looking at the economic impact of their volunteer hours. They could also create a return on investment by comparing the budget to the program to the amount of time donated by volunteers, so if the budget were $100,000 then they could say that investment returned 14 times the funds in volunteer hours. Some programs also translate the number of volunteer hours into how many full-time staff people that would be. © 2016 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.

Going from good to better MGVs in Iron County were instrumental in reinvigorating the Hurley School garden. They built a deer fence around the garden, added and improved the storage capabilities of the garden shed, and mulched between the garden beds. In addition to improving the garden infrastructure, volunteers mentored middle school members of the Garden to Market 4-H club. The club grows produce at the garden and then sells it at the Iron County Farmers Market to raise funds for the club. The program allows the students to develop gardening and entrepreneurial skills. Additional information that would make it better How many middle school members were mentored? How many volunteers were involved and number of hours? How many pounds of produce were grown and sold? How much money did the club raise? How did the students invest the funds? They have a good statement about the school garden but it could be better by gathering more specific information. © 2016 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.

Turn it over to Lynne who will give some great examples from her programs in Anoka County. © 2016 Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved.