Chapter 2: What’s Your Why?: Matching Evaluation Approach to Organizational Need

Following the case study of After-School All-Stars (ASAS), this chapter traces the trajectory of an organization building internal evaluation capacity, with potential application to other organizations seeking to accomplish similar goals. The chapter details the launching and scaling of a continuous quality improvement system, including insights into communication, timing, and attaching stakes to systems; it then provides a brief overview of key performance indicators; reviews systematic barriers to impact at ASAS and strategies the organization undertook to address these challenges; then focuses on implementation science to advance implementation before examining intervention efficacy; and concludes with organizational evaluation and key takeaways from the 5-year evaluation journey of ASAS.