Are you still there? Evaluating a CBPR project’s effort at capacity building

1. Are you still there? Evaluating a CBPR project’s effort at capacity building Lori M. Nascimento, MPH and LaVonna B. Lewis, Ph.D., MPH University of Southern California, Department of Family Medicine, Division of Community Health Part of the REACH 2010 – African Americans Building a Legacy of Health Coalition, Funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

2. Background • AABLH purpose and focus • Project timeline: 1999 – 2004 • REACH 2010 overarching aims • Three strategic directions • Education and prevention • Economic parity and resource development • Policy change

3. Background (continued) • Goal: capacity building • Providing resources and training • Involvement with development and implementation of project • Assisting with sustainability • Improving skills

4. Purpose of Capacity Building Study • Identify coalition members and organizations • Understand level and type of participation • Recognize influence of project on organizational structure and policies • Provide useful information to project regarding outreach and program suggestions

5. Content of presentation • METHODS • FINDINGS • Demographics • Participation with AABLH • Organizational change • Outreach • CONCLUSIONS

6. Methods • Administered telephone survey with unique instrument • Sample derived from AABLH database • All event attendees from inception – 12/2002 • Organizations (N=81) and individuals (N=138) located in target areas • Data collection took place from July – October 2003 • 43% response rate among organizations

7. Methods – Survey Instrument • Design to capture individual and organizational level data • 40 main questions with many sub-questions • Sections included: level and type of participation, change after involvement with project, effectiveness of project, relationship to project, outreach and organizational characteristics

8. Findings – Demographics of organizational respondents • 80% African American • High level of education • Middle to High income • Organizational focus: health, education, community/family • Organizations are small, with target population similar to that of AABLH project • 23% of those surveyed reported having a formal agreement with AABLH

9. Findings – Participation in Events

10. Findings – Level of Participation

11. Findings – Level of Participation

12. Findings – Level of Participation • Type of participation in the advisory groups was largely “attendance only”, followed by some who reported being the “organizational representative” • No respondents reported to have “led sessions”, “conducted surveys”, or provided “administrative support”

13. Findings – Organizational Change

14. Findings – Organizational Change • Most responses cite “received information or education” as how AABLH helped their organization • Other responses included “networking”, “awareness”, and [provided] “resources” • These responses were similar to those found when asking about helping the respondent’s personal goals and objectives

15. Findings – Organizational Change

16. Findings – Organizational Change

17. Findings - Outreach • Overall, respondents reported that AABLH was doing a good job in seeking out community residents • Most respondents also reported that AABLH is doing a good job of seeking out community organizations as partners • Among organizational respondents, the average number of AABLH participants per organization ranges from 1-50 with an average of 10

18. Findings - Outreach

19. Findings - Outreach

20. Findings - Outreach

21. Conclusion • Useful, but not perfect tool • Small sample size gives us mostly qualitative findings • Overall results were positive, but keep non-respondents in mind (outreach issues) • Part of a larger effort at capacity building and evaluation

22. Acknowledgements • Survey respondents in Los Angeles, Inglewood and North Long Beach • Community Health Councils, AABLH • University of Southern California • Students • Faculty

23. Contact Information • Capacity Building Evaluation Study • LaVonna B. Lewis: llewis@usc.edu • Lori M. Nascimento: lorimill@usc.edu • African Americans Building a Legacy of Health Project • Mia Boykin: mia@chc-inc.org • CDC - REACH 2010 • http://www.cdc.gov/reach2010/