Evaluation Studio (ES) began as a bold experiment in centering lived experience, creativity, and justice within research, design, and strategy. From the start, ES disrupted traditional frameworks by blending feminist, postcolonial, and participatory methods with strategic design and facilitation. Our approach positioned research not as a neutral process, but as a tool for connection, meaning-making, and transformation. Over eight years, ES became known for its community- and youth-led methodologies, justice-driven learning frameworks, and innovative practices that elevated stories and voices too often erased in conventional research.

Our work has spanned local grassroots organizations to national nonprofits and major institutions, with projects featured by leading funders and initiatives focused on education, gender justice, and community development. Along the way, we built trusted partnerships with organizations such as Deloitte’s Courageous Principals, Alliance for Girls, Planned Parenthood, United Way, Blue Shield Foundation, Girls Leadership, and more. What sets us apart is our refusal to replicate extractive models—choosing instead to co-create experimental cohorts, develop intersectional research instruments, and design participatory systems that help organizations adapt and evolve in real time. Today, after years of pioneering work, ES is still offering their expertise to select organizations and reshaping its approaches so that they are more accessible and distilling our lessons into a forthcoming book to share widely with the field.