How an Afrocentric lens unlocked meaningful evaluation of TAIBU’s impact in Black communities

The world of non-profits is one of ever-increasing complexity. Few of the issues we strive to address are simple. The communities we serve often face cultural, social and economic realities that can make accessing support programs challenging, so our efforts need to be well considered. On top of trying to peel back these layers, there’s the additional need to measure impact on both individuals and the broader community. For all the investment and effort, are we contributing to meaningful change? 

TAIBU is one organization who can confidently answer that question! Since 2008, TAIBU Community Health Centre has provided primary healthcare and delivered health promotion and disease prevention programs to Black clients and communities in the Greater Toronto Area.  

Afrocentric framework foundation 

After years of providing successful programs and building trust within communities, TAIBU saw an opportunity to build a comprehensive Afrocentric framework to guide their program and service development. This framework acts as a foundation for the organization’s evaluation activities, ensuring all future programs align to TAIBU’s goal to “improve, promote and protect the health and well-being for Black populations through quality healthcare and culturally designed primary health care services and strategies.”

To further help improve the health outcomes for more Black people, TAIBU aims to become a Centre of Excellence for Black health in Canada. By becoming a trusted resource, they can extend their reach and become “the go-to centre for knowledge and innovation regarding Black health and well being.” But to do that, they first need to measure their impact.  

Measuring success through an Afrocentric lens 

To help demonstrate their impact, TAIBU needed a framework to aid with collecting, monitoring, and evaluating data. And given their mandate to serve Black communities, any evaluation system they adopted would need to incorporate an Afrocentric lens to stay true to their mission, vision and values. 

With these priorities in mind, LogicalOutcomes proposed and implemented an Afrocentric Evaluation Framework that integrated culturally-informed evaluation approaches and measures informed by research and our experience working with community-based organizations. Our framework development approach ensured that we consulted extensively with TAIBU’s staff teams and minimized disruption to their operations.  

Additionally, with LogicalOutcomes TAIBU found a true partner that offered expertise in evaluation approaches and perhaps, most importantly, a shared value set. 

Since its delivery, the Afrocentric Evaluation Framework has guided program design and evaluation at TAIBU. The organization can now confidently see how they are moving the needle – the resulting data has empowered TAIBU to demonstrate and share their impact serving Black communities.

Continued benefits of an Afrocentric Evaluation Framework 

On top of delivering data to measure impact and identify opportunities for improvement, TAIBU’s ongoing commitment to creating and sharing research has allowed them to realize additional benefits, including:

• Influencing the broader approach to health and social services programing – “TAIBU’s applied research and program models are increasingly cited in health and social services literature, and utilized in shaping programs and services.” By sharing their data and findings, TAIBU is helping more communities find meaningful success faster and are well on their way to becoming Canada’s trusted community-based research and service design hub. 

• Aligning with funding partners that respect and understand the importance of an Afrocentric approach – TAIBU’s commitment to leveraging an Afrocentric lens extends to the funding sources they partner with. While this may sometimes mean having to say no to often hard to come by funding, this unshakable commitment means the integrity of their mandate and programs remains intact.  

• Illustrating the benefits of applying an Afrocentric lens in community work – The data and insights TAIBU shares highlights to funding partners how the application of an Afrocentric lens can help non-profits realize unique and impactful outcomes to Black communities.  

By continuing to share this data, it’s hoped that funding partners may be motivated to move away from traditionally stringent processes to a more flexible, negotiation-based approach. This flexibility would empower non-profits to develop nuanced, culturally-informed programming designed to best meet the unique needs of the communities they serve. 

TAIBU’s commitment to thoughtful evaluation illustrates how this kind of work can help non-profits demonstrate how they are moving the needle in different ways and contribute to positive change on a larger scale. LogicalOutcomes is proud to continue playing a role in supporting TAIBU’s important work.  

If you’d like to learn more about TAIBU Community Health Centre, their programs or how you can support their mission, visit taibuchc.ca.