What Matters, What Works: Advancing Achievement After School

This brief underscores the potential of after-school programs to advance children’s academic achievement. It shines a light on what matters most for programs that strive to promote academic success — namely, program quality and youth engagement — and it suggests what works by linking these program attributes to academic benefits. Based on the full outcomes report "Advancing Achievement," by Public/Private Ventures, the brief draws lessons from the Foundation’s Communities Organizing Resources to Advance Learning (CORAL) initiative. CORAL was an eight-year, $58 million after-school initiative aimed at improving education achievement in low-performing schools in five California cities.

Download Report (February 2008) (PDF, 832 KB)

Advancing Achievement: Findings from an Independent Evaluation of a Major After-School Initiative

This report presents full outcomes research on CORAL, an eight-year, $58 million after-school initiative aimed at improving education achievement in low-performing schools in five California cities. Findings in this report demonstrate the relationship between high-quality literacy programming and academic gains, and they highlight the potential role that quality programs may play in the ongoing drive to improve academic achievement. Commissioned by Irvine, this report was written by Public/Private Ventures.

Download Report (February 2008) (PDF, 770 KB)

Supporting Success: Why and How to Improve Quality in After-School Programs

This report, commissioned by Irvine and written by Public/Private Ventures, examines the program improvement strategies, step-by-step, that allowed the Foundation’s CORAL initiative to achieve the levels of quality needed to boost the academic success of young students. The report also makes specific policy and funding suggestions for improving program performance. Communities Organizing Resources to Advance Learning (CORAL) was an eight-year, $58 million after-school initiative aimed at improving education achievement in low-performing schools in five California cities.

Download Report (February 2008) (PDF, 554 KB)

After-School Toolkit: Tips, Techniques and Templates for Improving Program Quality

This toolkit, commissioned by Irvine and developed by Public/Private Ventures, offers program managers a practical, hands-on guide for implementing quality programming in the after-school hours. The kit includes the tools and techniques that increased the quality of literacy-focused programming and helped improve student reading gains in the Foundation’s Communities Organizing Resources to Advance Learning (CORAL) initiative — an eight-year, $58 million after-school endeavor to improve education achievement in low-performing schools in five California cities.

Download Report (February 2008) (PDF, 820 KB)

Gaining Ground: Supporting English Learners Through After-School Literacy Programming

New research has found English learners achieving reading gains comparable to those of their English-proficient classmates. This brief, commissioned by Irvine and written by Public/Private Ventures, presents findings that demonstrate a relationship between key approaches in CORAL — the Foundation’s eight-year, $58 million after-school initiative — and the academic progress of English learners. In addition to presenting findings, the brief suggests important considerations for any policymaker and funder interested in the success of English learners as a growing student population.

Download Report (February 2008) (PDF, 370 KB)

Growing Smarter: Achieving Sustainability in Emerging Community Foundations

It’s a striking paradox: As community foundations grow their assets, their sustainability is often threatened. This report, written by FSG Social Impact Advisors, offers guidance for how community foundations of virtually any size can achieve growth and sustainability, based on the experiences of 24 community foundations in California and around the United States. The report includes new data, case studies and a comparison of economic models. An Executive Summary and Discussion Guide, included in the paper, are also available as separate files for easy distribution. A Board Presentation introduces core concepts of the report.

Downloads (October 2007)
Full Report (PDF, 2 MB)
Executive Summary (PDF, 175 KB)
Discussion Guide (PDF, 37 KB)
Board Presentation (PPT, 5.6 MB)

New Experiments in Minority Voter Mobilization: A Report on the California Votes Initiative

This report evaluates the effectiveness of various voter outreach strategies designed to increase turnout among infrequent voters in California. As part of the California Votes Initiative, the Irvine Foundation supports a group of nonprofit organizations enlisted to mobilize voters in low-income and ethnic communities in the San Joaquin Valley and parts of Southern California. This report documents findings from the first phase of the initiative, covering the June 2006, November 2006 and March 2007 elections.

Download (Sept 2007) (PDF, 1 MB)

Midcourse Corrections to a Major Initiative: A Report on The James Irvine Foundation's CORAL Experience

This report, commissioned by Irvine and written by Gary Walker, President Emeritus of Public/Private Ventures, draws lessons from the reorientation of the Communities Organizing Resources to Advance Learning (CORAL) Initiative. CORAL was a $58 million, eight-year initiative aimed at improving education achievement in low-performing schools in five California cities. The report outlines the inherent challenges to making midcourse corrections to major initiatives. It also reveals lessons that foundations and nonprofits can learn from the CORAL experience, including the importance of midcourse reviews for multiyear initiatives and the value of setting clear and measurable interim outcomes.

Download report (May 2007) (PDF, 1.7 MB)
Download one-page summary (PDF, 487 KB)

Building Capacity: A Study of the Impact of The James Irvine Foundation Campus Diversity Initiative

Irvine established the Campus Diversity Initiative to increase college access and success for underrepresented minority students in California. From 2000 to 2005, the Foundation invested $29 million to assist 28 independent colleges and universities to strategically address issues of diversity on their campuses. This final evaluation report describes the outcomes of the CDI and highlights practical lessons about building capacity for diversity and evaluating campus diversity efforts. The review finds considerable variation among the participating campuses, with some common themes for the most successful schools

Download Full Report (May 2006) (PDF, 1.4 MB)
Download Executive Summary (May 2006) (PDF, 120 KB)

Faith, Community and Civic Action: Reflections on the Organized Religion Initiative

Between 1996 and 2005, Irvine funded faith-based institutions throughout California through the Organized Religion Initiative in order to draw newcomers and low-income Californians into civic life. The initiative examined how faith-based institutions contribute to democratic renewal, community problem-solving, and human development, particularly in immigrant and low-income communities. This report presents findings from the three-year evaluation of the initiative, which suggest that faith-based institutions can make significant contributions to civic engagement and community improvements.

Download (January 2006) (PDF, 473 KB)

Launching Literacy in After-School Programs: Early Lessons from the CORAL Initiative

Irvine launched the Communities Organizing Resources to Advance Learning (CORAL) initiative in 1999 with the goal of improving the academic achievement of children in the lowest-performing schools in five California cities. In 2004, CORAL adopted a more targeted approach for reaching this goal by integrating a regular schedule of literacy instruction into its after-school programs. This interim report, commissioned by Irvine and written by Public/Private Ventures, is based on research conducted between fall 2004 and summer 2005. The report documents CORAL’s progress toward implementing high-quality and consistent literacy programming. It presents early results in terms of youth’s positive reading gains and describes the program components that appear to have contributed to these gains. It also identifies challenges CORAL sites faced and successful strategies for addressing those challenges.

Download (December 2005) (PDF, 1.29 MB)

A Participatory Model for Evaluating Social Programs

Written by a team from UCLA's School of Public Policy and Social Research, the report describes a unique approach to evaluation that is gaining momentum in the nonprofit sector. With rising interest in building grantee capacity and increasing nonprofit effectiveness, foundations are looking to evaluation for purposes of accountability and to support the broader purpose of organizational learning and improvement. Part case study and part instruction guide, this report is intended for use by nonprofits, foundations, and professional evaluators alike.

Download (2002) (PDF, 94 KB)

Shall We Dance: Program Evaluation Meets Organizational Development in the Nonprofit Sector

First published in OD Practitioner, this article was coauthored by Marty Campbell, director of evaluation at The James Irvine Foundation, and Charles McClintock, dean of the School of Human and Organizational Development at Fielding Graduate Institute. Under the direction of Dr. McClintock, Fielding is currently offering professional courses that combine traditional evaluation with organizational development.

Download (2002) (PDF, 113 KB)

Creating a Culture of Inquiry: Changing Methods—and Minds—On the Use of Evaluation in Nonprofit Organizations

This report describes the results of the Working on Workforce Development (WOW) Project, a two-year experiment supported by The James Irvine Foundation to help nonprofit organizations use the tool of evaluation. The results contain valuable lessons for funders, evaluators, consultants and others interested in organizational development and capacity-building. Written by consultants Georgiana Hernández and Mary G. Visher, the report describes the project's design, implementation and outcomes. While the project experience reinforced the importance of good measurement, the project's success had less to do with whether measurement systems were developed and more to do with whether the organizations were able to create a culture that valued the process of self-evaluation itself. The agencies needed a new mindset that embraced data as an essential tool for improvement rather than as mere paperwork required for funding. The report reflects on these lessons and makes recommendations for how others embarking on this path might achieve the best results. Please call 415.777.2244 to request a hard copy.

Download (July 2001) (PDF, 236 KB)

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