In the aftermanth of Hurricanes Irma and María, Habitat for Humanity, an international nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing access to safe homes, with the support of donors, developed a five year plan to help rebuild hope and housing among families and communities most impacted by the disaster. Aware of the changing landscape of emergency, disaster response and recovery, Habitat for Humanity incorporated into its Puerto Rico Recovery Program an area of action dedicated to Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning (MEAL). In November 2020, the Puerto Rico Public and Applied Social Sciences Workshop (PR PASS Workshop) joined the Habitat for Humanity MEAL team as external collaborators in evaluation and learning. Our involvement in support of MEAL is a multifaceted as the Puerto Rico Recovery Program. The engagement is set to run from November 2020 to June 2023.
Our areas of collaboration and support are:
- Developmental Evaluation - A utility focused evaluation strategy that helps organizatiosn learn, innovate and adapt their programs in real time
- Most Significant Change Stories - A monitoring and evaluation technique that helps organizations become acquainted with the domains of change, planned and unexpected generated by their programs.
- Impact Evaluation - This is an 18 month participatory research that explores the impact of this 5 year Puerto Rico Recovery Program. This evaluation study understands that engaging those most impacted by an intervention in design and implementation of its evaluation increases both the rigor and relevance of the evaluation study.
In our first year, PR PASS Workshop has already
- created a year long Research Fellowship position,
- offered 10 internship learning opportunities of varying lengths and focus,
- added 7 social scientists to consult and collaborate on a variety of tasks, and
- co-facilitated 6 workshops