Introduction to Toolkit

Because trauma is such an endemic, powerful, and lingering aspect of gender-based sexual violence, trauma-informed evaluation has emerged as a central element of this toolkit. Trauma is multi-faceted and complex and is more pervasive in our communities then we might think with 76% of Canadian adults reporting having been exposed to some sort of trauma (Trauma-informed Practice Guide, 2013). Although, all of this trauma is not specifically related to sexual violence and rape culture, taking a trauma-informed approach to doing this challenging work can only be beneficial to those who have experienced any sort of trauma. Administrators, professors and students have repeatedly expressed to us the heavy emotional impact of listening to other people describe their experiences or of trying to articulate or reflect on their own personal experiences and responses. Front-line workers struggling to provide resources to students voiced their profound frustration and exhaustion. The pervasiveness of trauma combined with the complex and multifaceted ways in which trauma manifests throughout the various components of work addressing sexual violence makes employing a trauma-informed approach to evaluation essential and ethical.

We need to acknowledge and make room for trauma as we design and conduct evaluations. There is no downside to making every effort to do no harm, to minimize re-triggering traumatic responses. We hope this toolkit contributes to helping stakeholders understand and recognize underlying causes of trauma and potential strategies to conduct evaluation in a trauma-informed way.

While our overarching focus is on trauma-informed, survivor-centered evaluation, you will also find sections on arts-based evaluation, participatory evaluation, feminist evaluation, and some basic, practical suggestions for aligning goals, objectives and outcomes in evaluation design.