Mat Gendle and Amanda Tapler publish evaluation tool for community-based global learning programs

Director of Project Pericles and Professor of Psychology Mathew Gendle and Associate Director of Project Pericles and Senior Lecturer in Public Health Studies Amanda Tapler have co-authored a research article that was published in the most recent issue of the Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning.

In this work, entitled “The Community Engagement and Partnership Inventory (CEPI): An aspirational open-source instrument to assess community-based global learning programs,” the authors present a comprehensive evaluation instrument specifically designed for use by community-based global learning programs. The CEPI addresses a widespread need for open-source program development tools that are flexible and systematic in their approach.

The abstract for the article is as follows: “As community-based global learning (CBGL) programs become more common on college/university campuses and increasingly utilize the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals to guide programmatic outcomes, open-access assessment instruments that both benchmark and effectively measure programmatic enhancements over time are needed. The 147-item Community Engagement and Partnership Inventory (CEPI) provides a comprehensive set of aspirational CBGL best-practice statements in an easy-to-use, assessment-friendly format, and the CEPI-SF (short form) offers an abridged 47-item inventory for assessment strategies that do not require the level of detail offered by the full length CEPI. The CEPI/CEPI-SF provides a systematic evaluation of programs, applying the principles of critical global inquiry such that methods of administration and scoring can be flexible and tailored to program and institutional needs. The use of the CEPI/CEPI-SF as a tool for program evaluation, development, and best practice benchmarking is intended to support the development, sustainability, and long-term growth of CBGL activities that stress reciprocity, equity, and justice.”