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About the Evaluation Center

Welcome to the Evaluation Center at the University of Kentucky College of Education. The Evaluation Center operates as a university-wide resource that partners with schools, districts, corporations, nonprofits, and community organizations across Kentucky and beyond. While independent in its operations, the Center draws on the expertise of faculty and professional staff across the College of Education and the wider university, bringing depth in quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-method approaches as well as applied expertise in education, workforce development, and public health.

The Evaluation Center’s mission is to provide collaborative, utilization-focused services that generate actionable insights, improve data use, strengthen decision-making, and inform strategy and policy. Our work spans evaluation, research, capacity building, and continuous quality improvement, always with a focus on producing findings that are rigorous, relevant, and usable.

To guide this work, the Evaluation Center convenes a multi-disciplinary advisory panel and follows the American Evaluation Association’s guiding principles—systematic inquiry, competence, integrity, honesty, respect for people, and responsibility for the public good. We also integrate frameworks such as the International Rainbow Framework to ensure our work is grounded in ethical, inclusive, and evidence-based practice.

What We Do

Since Fall 2014, the Evaluation Center has supported more than 40 projects across education, workforce, corporate, and human service organizations, reaching all 120 Kentucky counties and extending impact nationally. Our projects range from large-scale program evaluations and grant-funded initiatives to organizational learning partnerships and applied research studies.

We tailor our services to the priorities of each partner, recognizing that meaningful evaluation and improvement cannot be one-size-fits-all. Our approach emphasizes co-design, cultural responsiveness, and actionable reporting—ensuring that findings can be immediately applied to strengthen practice, policy, and organizational learning.

In addition to traditional evaluation, the Center provides:

  • Grant and proposal consultation to strengthen competitiveness and readiness.
  • Continuous quality improvement support to embed feedback loops and real-time learning.
  • Capacity building and professional development for districts, corporations, nonprofits, and agencies.
  • Strategic planning and advisory services to align evidence with decision-making.

Our work meets the highest standards of rigor. Several projects have received the top designations from the U.S. Department of Education’s What Works Clearinghouse, including Regression Discontinuity Design Standards without Reservation and Group Design Standards without Reservation. These external validations reflect our commitment to producing credible, high-quality evidence that can drive improvement at multiple levels.