Learnings From a Developmental Evaluation of a Dynamic, Arts-Based Death and Grief Awareness Initiative: The Reflection Room Project

Linear approaches to project design and evaluation work well when problems are understood and the solutions to the problem are defined within specific boundaries. If projects contain some degree of uncertainty in the goals, outcomes, or context, evaluations based on standardization, consistency, and concreteness can hinder development and innovation. This paper outlines our process of engaging in a developmental evaluation as a means of cyclical evaluation, adaptation, and development through the multiple phases of the Reflection Room project; a participatory arts-based storytelling installation designed to support participants’ comfort with dying, death, and grief. This paper details our iterative evaluation process, which included increasing levels of participation from communities in co-designing the conceptualization of the innovation, designing the evaluation, and rapid real-time testing. We highlight our non-linear processes, emergent learning, and approaches to collaborating with experts-by-experience. Recommendations for others wanting to engage in developmental evaluation are shared, including engaging experts-by-experience early on and facilitating increasing levels of participation and decision-making role throughout the evaluation. We also recommend grounding the process within a theoretical framework; evaluating the stability, scale, or spread of the project; and adapting the evaluation and design to support organic variations in participants, setting, and emergent questions. Overall, the greatest value we found in conducting a developmental evaluation was in the flexibility and iterative nature of the methodology, which enabled us to efficiently pivot project goals, processes and outcomes to respond to the diverse and dynamic needs and welfare of Reflection Room participants.