The Relevance of People for the Role of Evaluators and Researchers: Applying People‐Centered Strategies in SEAS Research

ABSTRACT A reflexive stance of program evaluation requires evaluators and researchers to reflect on their role in fostering or interrogating the reproduction of inequities. For these professionals to fully leverage their potential to promote social changes, they must avoid neutral stances by committing to understanding context, challenging deficit narratives, and seeking a relational practice. As we reflect on our 5‐year social research journey within SEAS through the lens of the People‐Centered Evaluation approach (PCE), we aim to share the theoretical and applied ways our research engages with its core tenets. We share applied examples in the ways of prioritizing relational accountability, lived experience, community expertise, contextualization, and the collaboration of cultural liaisons to co‐create definitions of meaning and value, and centering issues of equity. In addition, we acknowledge the lived experience of participants coming from historically underserved communities and recognize participants' agency by centering their science identities within their place‐based contexts, their engagement in science‐related activities, and their intrinsic motivations to pursue science careers. We close our paper highlighting issues challenging access and participation in science‐related activities and the ways PCE enlightens a responsive, critical, yet humanized approach to research and evaluation.