This is the M&E Thursday Talk from Thursday, April 25th, when Rotary Peace Fellow, Michelle Helman, led a discussion on “Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning from the Inside-Out.”
Participatory evaluation, development, and peacebuilding methods aim to decolonize top-down approaches by integrating inclusive, bottom-up practice which can unintentionally reinforce asymmetrical power dynamics. Michelle Helman addressed how applying ‘inside-out’ evaluation tools in collaborative monitoring, evaluation, and learning (ME&L) practice can transform this obstacle into opportunity.
Michelle encouraged participants to examine, engage with, and re-imagine their own tools and practices. During the presentation, she offered opportunities to explore how, together, we can co-create definitions of commonly used vocabulary, check our assumptions, and ground theory in lived experience to design and integrate collaborative evaluation tools.
Following the presentation, participants engaged in an informative Q&A session.