K-5 Museum-School Partnership Evaluation at the Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum
Client: Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum | Location: Ridgefield, CT | Funding: Institute for Museum and Library Services
We partnered with The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum to build evaluation capacity among its education staff.
OVERVIEW
From 2019-2021, we focused on developing sustainable evaluation strategies, including for virtual programs and new challenges after the onset of COVID-19.
APPROACH
We undertook a number of activities before the pandemic that centered Aldrich’s Environments for Learning (EFL) program—a pilot program that promotes thinking in new ways through innovative art experiences:
Led a series of workshops to help education staff articulate intended impact
Co-developed data collection tools and protocols
Trained staff on evaluation best practices
Hosted a workshop to help staff make data-driven decisions based on the program’s impact during its pilot year
Once the pandemic set in, we collectively decided to build upon the evaluation capacity building work that had been centered on EFL and reframe it to be more sustainable in the long term.
We redesigned the EFL data collection protocols and instruments to apply to a broad swath of virtual programming and so the tools could be used by any full- or part-time staff with minimal training.
We also worked closely with the new education team to create a high-level Impact Framework for all the Aldrich’s programming that can serve as an evergreen document to guide the department’s planning and decision-making moving forward.
CLIENT TAKEAWAYS
With new tools and framework, the education team at Aldrich has been positioned to understand the impact of all their programs, even as the programs’ duration, medium, content, and staffing shifts over time. Aldrich staff was grateful for our responsiveness and flexibility, and they are still utilizing the framework to this day.
