Last week I attended the Fort Peck Meth Symposium, Maturing the New Buffalo. Our team was asked to evaluate the symposium and when I walked into the auditorium I could feel the meaning. I saw hope in the faces of people from tribes throughout Montana. Speakers were judges, tribal leaders, tribal presidents, elders, community members, people in recovery, tribal programs, and tribal chemical dependency programs. It is up to us as evaluators to create meaningful evaluations and results. The question I often ask is, “What does the evaluation mean to the community and how can it help them achieve their goals?” I believe that community members teach us what meaning looks like and how to find it in evaluation.
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