Measurement, Evaluation, Research, and Learning (MERL)
IYF is committed to MERL to guarantee we are fulfilling our mission to connect young people with opportunities to transform their lives. Measurement and data ensure this is not just a lofty goal; when IYF works to help youth develop the leadership, technical, and life skills to earn a livelihood, we measure those skills, and assess those changes in livelihoods. When IYF works with local partners and systems to improve services for youth, we assess the outcomes on a systemic level.
NEW! Interactive Dashboard
“We can achieve the ultimate goals of Transformation 2025—greater agency, more economic opportunities, and inclusive systems—only if every one of us stands by, for, and with young people.”
— Susan Reichle, President & CEO, IYF
In 2020, IYF created Transformation 2025, a five-year strategic plan focused on three key impact objectives: youth agency, economic opportunity, and systems change. Since 2019, IYF’s Measurement, Evaluation, Research, and Learning (MERL) team has been tracking the organization’s progress toward achieving its strategic objectives. To share progress and bring the data to life, the team designed and launched the Transformation 2025 Interactive Dashboard. IYF’s progress is continuously updated and presented through interactive data and user-friendly graphs.
IYF’s MERL team invites you to pick a strategic objective and explore our progress so far toward its achievement.
Values-based MERL approaches
Our approach to MERL reflects IYF’s values—Inclusion, Integrity, Inspiration, Innovation, and Impact—and the American Evaluation Association’s Guiding Principles for the professional ethical conduct of evaluators, which is established in IYF’s MERL policy. We use participatory measurement methods, engaging young people and partners throughout the process, ensuring our projects address youth-defined problems within the local context. Evaluation questions and approaches are utilization-focused, designed for their usefulness to the intended users. Supporting our deeply held commitment to ensure broad social inclusion, we use equitable evaluation approaches and use data to improve programs and reveal and solve access inequities.
Collaborating and learning to improve results
Collaborating, learning, and adapting (CLA) principles and processes are woven into IYF’s work from project outset. At IYF, program measurement and evaluation reflect an institutional commitment to collect locally and globally relevant, high-quality data. We collaborate with partners to use data to evaluate and adapt programs, and to leave existing MERL systems stronger than when we arrived. IYF is a learning organization, with structures and processes to make learning a part of our—and by extension our local partners’—daily routine. This starts by making iterative learning routine at the project level—examining available data together with local stakeholders, reflecting on information, and using adaptive management to make project changes accordingly. This extends to the organizational level, gathering iterative learning across projects, examining learnings in relation to our strategic objectives and global trends, storing them in a virtual Knowledge Hub for easy-access, producing evidence briefs on priority topics and evolving technical thinking according to new findings.
MERL Learning Agenda
Thought leadership through focused inquiry
IYF pursues an ambitious learning agenda, which outlines the high priority Positive Youth Development (PYD) questions of our time. IYF generates, focuses and compiles growing evidence on a variety of topics—such as the most effective approaches for building capacity and strengthening systems, and how to most effectively reach society’s most vulnerable—and supports partners to do the same. IYF also invests in external rigorous impact evaluations to understand the best ways to improve youth agency, increase economic opportunities and build youth-inclusive systems. IYF is dedicated to contributing to the evidence base, disseminating our learnings to the broader international development and research community.
Selected MERL Research and Resources
Tools and Resources:
- IYF MERL Policy
- Life Skills Survey Tool (LiSST)
- Roadmap for Measuring Soft Skills and SEL
- A Social Return on Investment (SROI) Study: Passport to Success
- IYF Learning Agenda
Evidence and technical briefs:
- IYF’s Systems Change Approaches and Successes
- Evidence of the Impact of IYF’s Passport to Success (PTS) Life Skills Training
- Evidence on the Reliability and Validity of IYF’s Life Skills Survey Tool (LiSST)
- Evidence of the Social Return on Investment of IYF’s Passport to Success in Mexico
Impact evaluations:
Outcome harvests:
Blog posts:
- How Measurement, Evaluation, Research, and Learning Can Create Positive Change in the Development Space
- Co-creating for Impact: Five Steps to More Responsive Youth Programming
- COVID Check-In: How Young People are Coping With Mental Health Challenges in Tanzania
- COVID Check-In: Reinvention Through Skills Training in Mozambique
To discuss MERL at IYF or to inquire about MERL partnerships, please contact Linda Fogarty, Director of Measurement, Evaluation, Research and Learning.