Theory of Change, Monitoring, and Evaluation Toolkit

A toolkit for developing a culture of evaluation and learning.

The West Yorkshire Violence Reduction Partnership worked in partnership with ECORYS to develop a user-friendly toolkit to support partners to develop Theories of Change, monitoring and evaluation practices.

By doing so, we hope this develops a culture of evaluation in West Yorkshire and emphasises the importance of evaluating projects when seeking to prevent and reduce serious violence.

Get in touch for advice or support

To support partners in this process, we offer introductory sessions that cover Theories of Change, monitoring and evaluation. In these sessions you will develop a Theory of Change for your own project or organisation, whilst learning how to effectively monitor and evaluate your progress and to better evidence the outcomes and impacts of work, and to adjust delivery where needed. To arrange a session for your own organisation or to receive a review of a Theory of Change you have developed, please get in touch with the VRP Knowledge Hub.

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The full toolkit and it's individual sections can be accessed using the links below  

Full Toolkit

Introduction to the Theory of Change Toolkit

This toolkit contains advice and resources for practical approaches to embedding a culture of learning in your organisation.  It is based around best practice, so may give you some ideas for tweaking or adjusting your approaches.

Download the Introduction Guide

Theory of Change

A Theory of Change (ToC) shows how an intervention (or project, programme, or policy) is intended to work. It is like a roadmap that indicates how the inputs and activities are expected to produce the desired outcomes and impact.

You can find out more in this video:

Download the Theory of Change

Monitoring: Understanding if your project is working

Your organisation may already be well experienced in collecting monitoring data.

Most routine monitoring focuses on outputs, and many organisations are less used to collecting data on outcomes. By having a clear understanding of what your project aims to achieve, you can set up your monitoring processes at the outset of project delivery.

You can find out more in this video:

Download the Monitoring Guide

Evaluation: Laying the foundations

Evaluation is the process of assessing the quality and value of something and why it has that value or quality. It should use relevant evidence to inform decisions about the value of policies and programmes and support the allocation of resources.

Our delivery partners might experience evaluation in a number of different ways: as the subject of someone else’s evaluation, by doing self-evaluation or by commissioning an evaluation from a professional researcher.

You can find out more in this video:

Download the Evaluation Guide

Evaluation Methods

Process evaluation seeks to capture the experiences of those delivering the intervention as well as those experiencing the intervention (i.e., young people, communities) to identify what is working well and any aspects that are, or may prove to be, problematic.

Various methods are used to assess how an intervention is working and why it might work better in a different context. 

You can find out more in this video:

 

Download the Evaluation Methods Guide

Evaluation Findings : What Next?

When developing your research outputs, the first thing to think about is your audience. It is important to identify your target audience and tailor your message accordingly, because different audiences have different needs, interests, and expectations.

Download the Evaluation Findings Guide

Glossary

Here you can find the meaning of key terms within the Theory of Change document.

Download the Glossary

Latest Resources

  1. Toolkits

    The Violence Reduction Partnership has developed resources for use in the ongoing work to tackle serious violence. You can receive support for your organisation from the available toolkits below.

  2. Research

    The Violence Reduction Partnership's (VRP) Knowledge Hub are continuously striving to better understand the scale and extent of violence in West Yorkshire as well as those root causes and protective factors that may make a person more susceptible or protect them from violence involvement or exploitation.

  3. Needs Assessment & Response Strategy

    The Needs Assessment for the West Yorkshire Violence Reduction Partnership (VRP) provides an evidence-based public health assessment of serious violence in the county, supported by the Influential Factors report. The Response Strategy provides a West Yorkshire framework for preventing and reducing serious violence.

Evaluation

The below evaluation reports demonstrate the impact of the training workshop sessions.

Download the Workshop Evaluation Report

Download the Workshop Evaluation Guide: Case study