Addressing Social Determinants of Children’s Health in Boston: Evaluation of Boston Children’s Collaboration for Community Health Grant Program

Mathematica is conducting a multi-year evaluation to learn from community organizations that receive funding from Boston Children’s Collaboration for Community Health. The Collaboration for Community Health funds community organizations in several strategic areas: (1) early childhood education and parenting; (2) healthy food access and youth physical activity; (3) stable and affordable housing; (4) family economic stability and mobility; (5) youth support systems; (6) community trauma; and (7) mental health. Mathematica has worked closely with Boston Children’s to develop theories of change and evaluation plans for the overall initiative and each strategic area and incorporate evaluation requirements into funding applications and reports. 

Mathematica also works with funded partners in the community to build monitoring and evaluation capacity – including developing evaluation plans and reporting on progress to Boston Children’s. Using the data reported by funded partners, interviews with funded partner staff, and external data sources in greater Boston, Mathematica is conducting a process and outcome evaluation of the overall Collaboration for Community Health grant initiative. The process evaluation provides cross-cutting information about the successes and challenges of funded community partners, identifies areas for improvement and mid-course corrections, and identifies environmental or contextual factors associated with activities that can improve the health and well-being of children and families in the community. The outcome evaluation will examine results for the overall initiative and identify lessons learned for individual grantee’s projects.