InPractice: Lessons for and from Practitioners

This blog post looks at how community colleges participating in MDRC’s Scaling Up College Completion Efforts for Student Success (SUCCESS) project use data-driven program management to keep tabs on key performance measures in real time and then act when those measures aren’t moving in the right direction.

Homeboy Industries’ (HBI) experience implementing a new data system was described in an earlier InPractice post. This post examines the complexities and challenges that must be addressed before successful implementation can take place, and how HBI managed that change process.

How does your organization keep track of its progress toward meeting key performance benchmarks? In this edition of InPractice, we share a few tips on how to use staff meetings to make sure your team is staying on-target.

Homeboy Industries (HBI), one of the largest gang rehabilitation and reentry organizations in the world, is transforming its data infrastructure and the way it uses technology to better support its client-centered program services. MDRC recently collaborated with HBI on a project to establish program logic models and to assess the organization’s data collection needs and practices. This post draws on what was learned from that collaboration.

In this commentary, originally published in District Administration, MDRC’s Michelle Maier and Shira Mattera offer evidenced-backed advice for policymakers and practitioners about how to invest new federal funds to enhance the quality of preschool programs.

Many programs and agencies collect data about their clients and service use but they may not have the time and resources to use those data to inform their decision making. This post shares some simple approaches for how to use data to improve programs.

Financial aid reduces dropout rates, yet college students are unaware of many financial resources available to them. The 2021 American Rescue Plan Act requires colleges to tell students they can apply for more aid. These evidence-based strategies can help schools create effective messages about aid to get positive responses.

Unemployed or underemployed parents have trouble paying child support. In the Families Forward Demonstration, child support agencies sought to help parents get better jobs and increase their earnings by teaching job skills needed by local employers. The questions arising from the project may help other agencies evaluate prospective job training partners.

The COVID-19 pandemic forced leaders of the Male Student Success Initiative at the Community College of Baltimore County to create an entirely online environment for a formerly hands-on program. Here are some measures the program took to deepen its commitment to supporting and mentoring its students.

The InPractice blog is MDRC’s place for sharing resources and tips developed by practitioners, for practitioners. This review of the past year’s posts shows how our program partners adjusted to difficult, uncertain conditions and continued to deliver services during the worst of the pandemic.