Scorecard Allows 12 Promise Neighborhood Grantees and more than 200 Neighborhood Partners to Use Data to Show Impact of Their Work
ROCKVILLE, Md. – Through an open bidding process in 2013, the U.S. Department of Education has selected Clear Impact, the world’s leading Results-Based Accountability experts, to provide coaching, training, technical assistance, and the Clear Impact Scorecard 3.0 Software to the 12 Promise Neighborhood grantees and their partners.
The partnership validates Clear Impact’s current work with the Promise Neighborhoods. Since 2011, Clear Impact has been working with the Promise Neighborhoods Institute at PolicyLink, a nonprofit that assists Promise Neighborhoods in connecting local resources and serves as a link to investors, to integrate the Clear Impact Scorecard software with the longitudinal data systems required of each neighborhood by the Department of Education.
With this grant, all 12 grantee organizations will use the Scorecard to track and report the impact of their solutions on their respective neighborhoods. Clear Impact will also provide in-person and virtual trainings in Results-Based Accountability to help neighborhood leaders understand how to use data to select, assess and adjust specific tactics.
“We truly believe that leaders’ effective use of data will improve the lives of children and families in communities like the Promise Neighborhoods,” said JaNay Queen, senior consultant Clear Impact. “As part of our work with the Promise Neighborhood Institute at PolicyLink, we have already seen how tracking and analyzing data can make grantees more successful. Eastside Promise Neighborhoods has experienced a 3% decrease in student mobility and a 16% decline in absenteeism for seventh- and ninth-graders. Communities are successfully using the Scorecard to predict successes and anticipate problems.”
Inspired by the Harlem Children’s Zone, the U.S. Department of Education’s federal Promise Neighborhoods program seeks to break the cycle of generational poverty by wrapping children in a pipeline of health, social, and educational supports from birth through college to career.
Clear Impact’s consultants, educators, coaches, and facilitators use Results Based Accountability to develop the capacity of government and non-profit organizations to produce measurable results for clients and communities. Results-Based Accountability™ is a disciplined way of thinking and taking action, which communities can use to improve the lives of children, youth, families, adults and the community as a whole. Developed by Mark Friedman and described in his book Trying Hard is Not Good Enough, it is also used by organizations to improve the performance of their programs.
