Evergreen Solutions was retained by Western Washington University as an evaluator to assess the provisions of the Emergency Management for Higher Education Grant. The grant was used to partner with a number of community institutions to review, improve, and enhance campus emergency management planning efforts. In addition, the evaluation determined whether the overall grant goals and specific objectives of the grant were being met effectively, with high quality, and in accordance with requirements.
Specifically, Evergreen analyzed a number of measures the grant program was required to complete against what the grant program actually achieves. This included: ensuring multimedia training presentations were of exceptional quality; evaluating in-class training presentations based on delivery, comprehensiveness, and effectiveness; ensuring that the number of persons trained and number of classes conducted met grant requisites; ensuring that training and exercising plans were both effective-in-practice and sustainable; and ensuring that written all-hazard plans included elements that incorporated National Incident Management Systems and Incident Command Systems.
In addition, Evergreen evaluated outside partnerships developed and leveraged for emergency planning and response. This included evaluating partnering across and between campuses and community partners and analyzing information-sharing with other institutions of higher education to ensure that processes were highly effective. Evergreen worked closely with project stakeholders to evaluate progress and assist project leaders with tracking completion of grant goals.