Research and Evaluation for Public Health Programs
Program Design and Evaluation Services (PDES) is a unique research and evaluation unit within both the Multnomah County Health Department and the Oregon Public Health Division. The PDES team of experts provides a full range of professional services to design, evaluate, and refine public health programs, and communicates its findings through publications, presentations, and reports.
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PDES centers values in building trust with community partners
As a result of applying an equity lens on our evaluation work, PDES has been using different approaches when collaborating with community members as evaluation partners. One approach involved using a values-based exercise at the beginning of the community engagement process. Specifically, PDES supported the evaluation of the Community Health Improvement Planning process, a partnership between Oregon Health Equity Alliance (OHEA) and Multnomah County Health Department. Midway through the evaluation, we engaged a small group of community members on the qualitative analysis. Community members were given a stipend as compensation. Because this was the first time we had worked together, we began with an exercise to identify our professional and personal values. This process of identifying our values, built trust and fostered a sense of safety and transparency in the group dynamics, which in turn strengthened the analytic process and improved the overall evaluation.
This process proved so beneficial that all PDES staff collaborated to identify internal organizational values that guide all of our work. The values we collectively identified, focus on collaboration, equity, flexibility, and integrity. These values are described in more detail
here.