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We are increasingly concerned to try and gauge the effectiveness of our grant programmes through monitoring and evaluation. We have well-established procedures to monitor the outputs from the work we fund and we keep in regular contact with many beneficiaries.
Evaluation of the effectiveness of grants is much more difficult. Many of the youth work and community development initiatives funded by the Trust have long-term objectives. These objectives (e.g. the personal development of individuals, or the development of community organisations) may require an extended time period, often of 10-20 years, to be realised and it is notoriously difficult to measure convincing results.
But where major grants are concerned, or where work is considered to be of particular importance, we endeavour to work with grant recipients, at the start of each project, to agree deliverable evaluation criteria. In one case, Ewanrigg Family Support Project, we commissioned Lancaster University to evaluate the project.
We would encourage all applicants for multi-year funding to consider making research and evaluation a key part of their project. We would also welcome discussions with those organisations who are interested in conducting a longitudinal study of the effectiveness of a particular project.