With 95 Evaluators and growing in the Network, we are highlighting an ACE Evaluation Network Member each month to share their experiences and current projects with the ETB® community.

Advancing Culturally-responsive and Equitable (ACE) Evaluation Network Member, Nicole Clark, LMSW is a licensed social worker and owner of Nicole Clark Consulting. She partners with mission-aligned, BIPOC-centered, women-led, and allied organizations whose work supports the lived experiences and advancement of women, girls, and gender expansive youth of color. Nicole consults, speaks, trains, and writes on a variety of topics including the reproductive justice framework and its incorporation in various settings, community-based participatory research, program design, strategic planning and organizational sustainability, and culturally responsive and equitable evaluation (CREE). Nicole is based in Washington, D.C.

What first attracted you to the ACE Evaluation Network?

I joined the ACE Network in 2018, back when it was housed under the Annie E. Casey Foundation. I found out about the Network via a colleague familiar with ETB. At the time, I was involved with various evaluation networks including the American Evaluation Association and the Center for Culturally Responsive Evaluation and Assessment, but I was excited to hear that there was a network for evaluators of color and champions of CREE.

What do you value most about the ACE Evaluation Network?

From the Coffee Breaks and professional development series to the CREE Community of Practice, I’ve valued being in community with fellow Evaluators of color — many whom I knew prior to joining the Network — getting to know the Change Matrix team over the years, and connecting with more Funders of Evaluation.

What’s a current project you are working on?

I’m partnering with Mathematica to co-lead a theory of change (ToC) process for Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s (RWJF) maternal health and birth equity funding strategies, as part of RWJF’s Transforming Health and Healthcare Systems initiative. What was supposed to have been a short-term project — conducting qualitative interviews with leaders in maternal health, birth equity, and reproductive justice to develop the ToC — for me has led to an extension through 2024. My involvement will include group facilitation, quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis, advocacy, and facilitating the ToC implementation. This project is memorable for me as I was connected to RWJF by fellow ACE Evaluation Network Member Mindelyn Anderson!

To learn more about Nicole, connect with her on LinkedIn.