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Evaluation Framework for the Akonadi Foundation

The mission of the Akonadi Foundation is "to support the development of a powerful social change movement to eliminate structural racism and create a racially just society." In service of that mission, the Akonadi Foundation makes grants to social justice, organizing and other organizations in Oakland and nationally, particularly ones that apply a racial justice and structural racism analysis to their work. They also convene groups working on these issues and contribute through their own leadership and advocacy. Akonadi is very interested in keeping their own work focused on contributing to tangible outcomes for people of color in Oakland, and finding ways through evaluation to help their partners and other grantees document their contributions to these outcomes as well.

Akonadi commissioned CAPD to create an evaluation framework for their Oakland and national work. To accomplish this, we worked with the Board and staff, interviewed grantees, met with experts and reviewed some of the most current literature on how to assess progress towards racial equity, policy and advocacy work, and reductions in structural racism. This information was used to help Akonadi Board and staff articulate further their theory of change and the kinds of outcomes they would hope their work could contribute to achieving. The evaluation framework describes a set of potential long-term, intermediate and short-term outcomes in three areas: improved well-being of individuals (more equitable population outcomes); reduction in structural racism (policy and institutional outcomes); and increased capacity to do this kind of work (more people and organizations working effectively to elevate racial equity, reduce structural racism and promote racial justice). It also describes methods by which these kinds of outcomes can be measured.