About Elevate
Building a
movement
around place-based learning and evaluation
Our country is full of inspiring communities,
each carrying its own story.
In your work as funders of place-based learning and evaluation, you may be working to center communities more fully in decisions — or already actively doing so — while also navigating the realities of your organization and the broader field.
Along the way, you’re likely working through big questions like how to shift ownership, deepen partnerships, and create space for communities to shape what happens where they live.
You’re working to better reflect
theirvoices
Even with the intentionality you bring, this work is deeply nuanced. Critical insights and lessons learned (especially the tough ones) too often remain siloed, held separately across places and foundations instead of shared more widely.
And when that happens, we all miss out on the chance to learn and grow together.
So, how can we turn what we know into collective benefit?
ELEVATE is a community of practice specifically for place-based funders in learning and evaluation.
It’s a safe space where you can learn from one another and apply those hard-won insights directly into your work and decision-making. With ELEVATE, you can openly celebrate wins and explore challenges (and everything in between) with peers who understand the complexities and the context.
At the heart of our work are the values that brought us here:
The simple, yet often overlooked, belief that a culture of learning is imperative and that community voices should be centered. By learning together, and continually challenging and expanding our own perspectives, we can turn those values into practice at a broader scale.
If you’re ready to join our collective effort, this is your invitation.
ELEVATE is built for funders of place-based learning and evaluation like you.
Who we’re for
No one understands the challenges and possibilities of this work better than those living it every day. Unlike other philanthropic networks, our only focus is place-based learning and evaluation.
Expect real conversations that don’t shy away from the tough, even uncomfortable, realities of the field, alongside frameworks, resources, and collective insights that strengthen your practice.
our mission
Bring funders of place-based learning and evaluation together to learn openly, strengthen their work, and elevate the leadership of people closest to the issues and their communities.
our vision
A future where philanthropy is practiced differently: every funding decision begins with place; honors local people, histories, and context; and supports communities to lead and set priorities in the places they call home.
We’re not here to simply build a community and check a box.
Evaluating ELEVATE
We take our own learning and evaluation seriously, paying close attention to how participants engage, what’s useful (and what’s not), and how you’re turning shared insights into changes in practice that benefit your organizations and communities.
And, equally important, we want to identify if there are ways that ELEVATE could be doing things differently so we can continue to refine our offerings and make sure they meet the evolving needs of place-based funders of learning and evaluation.
