Learning Before Going to Scale: An Introduction to Conducting Pilot Studies
“If I had known then what I know now, I would’ve done it much differently.” How many of us have found ourselves looking back on the rollout of a [...]
The Core Value of Heart-Centeredness—Creating space for heart in the workplace
This is the second blog of the seven-blog series, Creating a workplace where people thrive: The power of organizational core values. How do companies create a thriving workforce? It [...]
Magnolia’s Core Values: What They Are and How We Live Them
This is the first blog of the seven-blog series, Creating a workplace where people thrive: The power of organizational core values. When I started Magnolia in 2002, I didn’t [...]
5 Strategies to Effectively Monitor and Evaluate Program Implementation
Many of our studies involve monitoring and evaluating program implementation to learn more about how programs are delivered and the degree to which they are delivered as intended. Examining program [...]
Cultivating a Common Language: The 2019 Magnolia Staff Retreat
At Magnolia, one of our core values is cultivation. This means we create an environment where new ideas, opportunities, and innovation thrive, which benefits both our team and the clients [...]
Sexual Abuse by School Employees: A Blog on Insufficient State Laws and Policies
All too regularly, we see a news headline that a school employee has engaged in sexual abuse or misconduct with students in a K–12 school. Often, an accused teacher [...]
Increase Online Survey Response Rates with These Seven Tips
At Magnolia Consulting, we often use online surveys as a data collection tool in our evaluation studies. Online surveys are an efficient and effective way to gather information from participants [...]
An Evaluator’s Guide to Performing Successful Site Visit Observations
For external evaluators, site visits (e.g. visiting schools) provide an opportunity to experience the activity, program, or product first-hand while also offering a chance to connect in-person with participants from [...]
Essential Tools for Recruiting Sites for Studies: Finding the Needle in a Haystack
At Magnolia Consulting, one of our specialities is designing and implementing curriculum efficacy or effectiveness studies, and we are often tasked with recruiting sites (i.e., schools or school districts) to [...]
5 Tips to Streamline Your Data Cleaning Process
Data cleaning is possibly the most critical step in running statistical analyses. A general rule of thumb is to spend 80% of your time cleaning data and the remaining 20% [...]