GRANT DESCRIPTION

To support community engagement by involving citizens in projects to build and improve neighborhood playgrounds in 10 Knight communities.

ASSESSMENT PURPOSE & APPROACH

Key Questions

• How does KaBOOM! engage volunteers in community engagement and does it increase their skills?

• What factors promote the successful implementation of KaBOOM! projects?

• What characteristics of KaBOOM! community partnerships support community engagement and how does partnering with KaBOOM! increase the community engagement capacities of partners?

• Under what circumstances is community engagement realized utilizing short and focused intervention strategies that results in a concrete product (e.g. a playground for community youth)?

Approach: The evaluation will look at five of the 14 KaBOOM! sites commissioned by Knight (located in Philadelphia, Detroit and Miami). The project will assess participant and community-based organization outcomes through community volunteer surveys, events observations, interviews with community-based organizations, KaBOOM! staff and volunteers, programmatic data review, and documentation of physical changes at build sites and their surroundings. The project is also focused on improving KaBOOM!’s own data collection systems and survey instruments.

Assessment Partner: Public/Private Ventures

PROJECT FINDINGS

The project launched in 2010 and is scheduled to generate findings by the end of 2011.