The Monitoring, Evaluation and Impact (MEI) Partnership was formed in June 2014 in response to a capacity building need identified by voluntary and community organisations in Brighton and Hove. The partnership was initiated by Community Works, brokered by Community University Partnership Programme and responded to by the University of Brighton School of Applied Social Science. The partnership has brought together academic knowledge of data collection, analysis and research ethics with intelligence and current experience of sector needs to develop a capacity-building approach that enables community practitioner expertise and experience to come to the foreground.

Partnership values

Our partnership approach is underpinned by our shared values and our joint commitment to building capacity for monitoring, evaluation & impact in the not-for-profit, community sector.  We seek to promote improved understanding of community data practice and raise awareness of community data burden.

In order to do this we have taken an approach that is:

• Non-consultancy, not-for-profit & educational
• Agnostic (we provide information on a range of tools, metrics or models – not just one)
• Focused on citizen and community needs, responsive to change and the need for dialogue funding and commissioning environments

Our aims are to:

• Share and encourage sharing of good practice among citizens, communities, commissioners, funders and policy makers
• Think sustainably for long-term capability
• Be creative & solution-focused
• Learn as we go, define in the doing
• To influence both policy and practice relevant to the community, not-for profit sector