Webinar Resources

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Anna Ghosh: Hi, everyone! Good morning, good afternoon, wherever you are. I’m going to kick us off for this webinar. This is hosted by Community Science.

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Anna Ghosh: We are a group of, evaluation and strategy practitioners from a variety of disciplines. We work with governments, foundations, nonprofit organizations.

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Anna Ghosh: We form solutions to social problems through community and other systems change, fostering learning and improved capacity for social change.

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Anna Ghosh: I’m Anna Ghosh. I’ll be your facilitator for this webinar. I lead the Health Equity Practice Area, Community Science.

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Anna Ghosh: And this is called Storytelling as a Method, Bridging Evaluation and Healing. And I have a couple decades of being in evaluation practice, and many more decades of experiencing family mental illness.

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Anna Ghosh: Today, I’m joined on our panel by Kian Lee. She’s the President of Community Science.

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Anna Ghosh: Randy Gilbert, who leads our Youth Engagement and Leadership Practice Area at Community Science.

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Anna Ghosh: And Amy Moffitt, who’s a special guest and an advocate for mental health and community well-being.

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Anna Ghosh: So I’m just gonna give us some background before we jump into our panel discussion. So this panel really came together. We all share a common interest around mental health, and as some of you might have heard, in 2023, the U.S. Surgeon General brought increased attention

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Anna Ghosh: to the issue of loneliness and isolation that many Americans face, and as well as the associated health risks, like anxiety or depression, as well as cardiovascular disease.

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Anna Ghosh: And even though there’s been more people talking about this since the COVID pandemic, he pointed out that these rates of loneliness and isolation were there and rising even prior to the pandemic.

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Anna Ghosh: So, today’s panelists, they come from different perspectives, but what we all share is this sense that telling stories is an important part of reducing loneliness and isolation, and when you tell your story, it creates a pathway to improving mental health.

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Anna Ghosh: And it has relevance… storytelling has relevance both for evaluators as well as behavioral health practitioners.

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Anna Ghosh: So when we think about it from the evaluation perspective, we gather stories, to give human voice, to further understand the, you know, the what, the who, the where, why are we seeing changes?

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Anna Ghosh: And from the behavioral health perspective, We know that…

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Anna Ghosh: Peer support groups and mental health programs, they facilitate peer sharing and personal stories as part of that therapeutic and healing process.

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Anna Ghosh: So, I think we can… we all agree that, sharing difficult personal experiences and feeling really understood and related to, feeling validated, listened to, with empathy can be just transformative in itself, just that fact of sharing your story.

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Anna Ghosh: And so that means evaluators, when we go and ask people to share stories with us, we have an opportunity to consider it more than, you know, quote, data collection.

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Anna Ghosh: And we really have this role to care for the stories that we’re asking for, and being intentional about the way we facilitate

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Anna Ghosh: That story-sharing space.

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Anna Ghosh: And, you know, just bringing up that right now, in this time, people do feel at risk, you know, sharing who they are and about their personal identity, because there… there are some threats to, to what’s shared.

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Anna Ghosh: So, for this hour, we’re going to begin with a panel discussion, and then get into the comments and questions you all proposed from the audience.

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Anna Ghosh: And the overall topics that we’re going to probe panelists about are these that are on the slide here. What happens when someone feels truly listened to?

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Anna Ghosh: How can evaluators build approaches that create safe spaces?

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Anna Ghosh: for story sharing and emotional expression, then how might evaluations become not just this process of collecting data, as I said, but a meaningful exchange

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Anna Ghosh: for participants and for their well-being. And then we’ll ask each other, what are those conditions and skills that evaluators need so they can collect and use stories with the… with the care that’s needed and in a culturally appropriate manner?

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Anna Ghosh: So, you know, our discussion’s really focused on those considerations that are coming up for us when we ask for people, for their stories. It’s that process of gathering stories.

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Anna Ghosh: And it’s actually the first time the four of us are coming together to discuss this topic, and so we’re excited to see what comes out of it, between us, as well as, from everyone who joined, who posed your questions. We want this to be the start of a conversation.

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Anna Ghosh: And evaluators really just aren’t specifically trained to… to care for stories in the way that maybe therapists are trained, and I love that a registrant pointed that out, too. We’re not trained

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Anna Ghosh: psychotherapists, but in some cases, we need to have those skills. So there is this bridge between these fields.

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Anna Ghosh: So,

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Anna Ghosh: So we’re going to try to touch in the discussion around the questions that you ask, and we’ll try to get to them as much as possible, but this might be a longer conversation than the hour holds, and we’ll just try to keep that conversation going.

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Anna Ghosh: So, with that, I’d just invite you to put your, questions in the Q&A, and we’ll… after the panel gets a chance to discuss, we will, we will read out your questions. You won’t see each other’s questions, so… but don’t worry, your questions will be there, and we’ll be monitoring it.

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Anna Ghosh: So with that, I’m going to stop sharing the slides so we can all see each other.

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Anna Ghosh: From the panel

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Anna Ghosh: And I’m gonna… I’m gonna start with Amy. So, Amy, you and I met because we, we didn’t know it at that time. We were, like, virtually strangers working in an office together, and,

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Anna Ghosh: And I was a little upset because you had organized, some people to come into the office and speak about mental illness, and I sort of stormed down to your office and said I wasn’t ready for that.

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Anna Ghosh: And… and I’ll get into why I wasn’t ready, but you shared that, you know, you actually do this, and you were… you are in a place of readiness, so I wanted to… to ask you, what has story sharing

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Anna Ghosh: For you, been in, like, in your life, and how has it made a difference, and what brought you to the point where you thought that this was a very healthy thing to do and bring up?

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Amy Moffett: Well, first of all, I’ll say I was so glad you did come down to my office, because it really gave me such a good way to think about stories, but…

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Amy Moffett: I mean, I grew up in a family of people that told stories, but never, ever about mental health or that type of challenge. And so, that… that door was never opened for me, and I think probably when I hit midlife, I started to feel like if I didn’t share my story, it might start to overwhelm me.

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Amy Moffett: And… and have a negative impact on those around me. I have a family, I have

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Amy Moffett: daughter. So, there’s a difference between telling your story if you’re with a therapist or a counselor versus telling your story to a friend or to a group of people that are, supportive.

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Amy Moffett: And so, I started getting involved with NAMI, National Alliance for Mental Illness, and they had a program called In Our Own Voice, which was great.

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Amy Moffett: And it trained people to go out and give presentations, in a certain construct about their own history with mental illness. And for me, that became very empowering. First of all, because I got to hear people’s stories.

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Amy Moffett: And… and hear, wow, you know, they’re successful, they’re doing it, they’re following these treatment options, they’re opening their lives to things, and that was very powerful to me.

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Amy Moffett: And it also made me think that if

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Amy Moffett: If I don’t share my story, someone else may not share theirs.

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Amy Moffett: Because it was becoming apparent, to me that

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Amy Moffett: you know, when I would open myself up a little bit, somebody else said, oh, I bet I can share, too. And it strengthened the friendship, or the relationship.

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Amy Moffett: anywhere, any type of relationship. So, for me, it started being really empowering, and when I started talking about my own challenges with mental illness.

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Amy Moffett: then I could start to tell the other parts of my story. You know, I had taken that burden off a little bit. We write our stories in real time, right? We keep adding pages.

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Amy Moffett: And so, sharing that piece about my mental health made space for the other parts of me, where that no longer defined me, it was just part of me. It was…

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Amy Moffett: part of that story. So, it was very effective, it was very helpful, and it really brought some good people into my life as well.

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Anna Ghosh: Thanks for sharing that, Amy. And as you’re talking, I’m realizing, you know, how whole you became by sharing your story.

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Anna Ghosh: And I’ll just… I’ll add why, you know, where I was at the time was, I guess, maybe didn’t want to be whole in front of everyone. I had spent most of my life being told not to talk about mental illness. My mother suffered

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Anna Ghosh: a major mental illness, and we were just told, don’t talk about it, don’t mention it to anyone, just shh.

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Anna Ghosh: And then I also came from an immigrant family, and so we also… the quietness was a way of life, just keep things under wraps, don’t talk.

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Anna Ghosh: keep moving. And so… so there were those things, but… and then there were also all the comments I heard out in the world, you know, it’s not always a friendly place in terms of the way that mental illness is talked about.

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Amy Moffett: the terms that are used, the way that people are described, so I definitely had a fear that if I start talking, something bad is going to happen.

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Anna Ghosh: And so, so I definitely was reactive to, like, this isn’t supposed to happen, you’re not supposed to be in a public space where you talk about sharing your experiences.

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Anna Ghosh: But I actually, you know, through our talking together, I, you know, we made this connection. We actually met right before the pandemic, this just happened.

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Amy Moffett: I barely.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, we ended up staying connected and checking in with each other through the pandemic, and as I’m reflecting back, it, like, helped reduce that, like, isolation and loneliness that we were talking about by sharing our story. We kind of.

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Anna Ghosh: started a… a way of connecting with each other, so I really appreciate that.

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Amy Moffett: Me too, yeah.

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Amy Moffett: Yeah, I mean, I will say, Anna, too, you know, and I’ll say I’m not an evaluator, but as you’re speaking and this conversation flows, we do have a really long way to go.

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Amy Moffett: Especially in the workplace. And when you and I met, I was hot out of this training program. I was so excited, I was listening to inspirational people, didn’t even… I had such, you know, didn’t even dawn on me to check in with people before I brought someone in. I was laser-focused on what this had done just for me, which was short-sighted.

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Amy Moffett: But I think what happens when people tell their stories is there’s the potential for an audience to say, oh, because of that mental health challenge, that explains their behavior. But oftentimes, no, it doesn’t. That behavior is just my behavior, or my personality, or I’m sad today.

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Amy Moffett: which has nothing to do with a mood disorder, I’m just really sad because something happened. And so, we do have a really long way to go. It’s great that we’re talking about these things, but we’re scratching the surface, especially, I think, with youth and on the other spectrum, professionally.

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Amy Moffett: It’s… it’s still a little bit risky.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, I agree, I totally agree.

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Anna Ghosh: Thanks for saying that.

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Anna Ghosh: I’m going to turn it to Brandy, just talking about that professional aspect as an evaluator. I know that you’ve had to, you know, you collect stories all the time. You hear from people, you ask for their experiences in a really deep way. Can you talk about what, you know.

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Anna Ghosh: Some of the work that you’ve done, and what you’ve had to think about, what you’ve had to hold, to do this well.

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Brandi Gilbert: Yeah, this is one of my favorite topics, and something that Amy just said about how people can be dismissive of stories reminds me of something that I try to ground myself in, which is that stories are grounded in systems.

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Brandi Gilbert: So a story might just seem like, oh, you know, they don’t have work because they have a mental health illness, or, like, whatever the story might be, feel dismissive. A lot of times it’s connected to how people navigate systems, which is so linked to our work around evaluation, research.

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Brandi Gilbert: systems change and understanding, like, what does a story mean? What do a set of stories mean? And I was just, emailing you, Anna, and saying, like, I love the question queue that came from this audience, and such deep questions, and a lot of the questions were about jumping the gun just a little bit. But I noticed that a lot of the questions were really about, like, tips. Like, how do you do this work well? What do you hold? What do you consider?

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Brandi Gilbert: And I have 3 to 4 that I want to share.

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Brandi Gilbert: So, one is thinking about, safe spaces. So, I know a lot of people also sort of throw around that term, but just thinking about how it means many things. So, physical spaces, and I’ll say, like, my examples really draw on understanding the stories of youth and young adults who, a lot of times have experienced trauma. And when I say systems, I think a lot about the intersection of systems, like the education system, the housing.

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Brandi Gilbert: health, juvenile justice, criminal justice, child welfare, like, they… I all… I see them all like this. And so, thinking about, how those relevant… those lessons are relevant to any sort of story sharing, because we all have traumas and vulnerabilities. So, the first thing is space.

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Brandi Gilbert: So whether you’re in a virtual space or physical space, our team has had to consider, like, how to make people feel safe. So in a physical space, that means things like neutral locations, and that could mean violence, that could mean past association with trauma, like, where can you have neutral ground? And then also, how do you get those who are involved in the research or evaluation study to tell you what are the good grounds, because

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Brandi Gilbert: as evaluators, how do we know?

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Brandi Gilbert: also,

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Brandi Gilbert: safe, even… even my space, so I think about when I do an interview, for instance, if I’m in person, where do I sit in a room? I never sit behind a desk. Even, like, I will rearrange a whole room to not make somebody feel like, oh, it can be that association with, the criminal justice system, or filling out paperwork, or all different kinds of things that we have. So just thinking… we think a lot about space.

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Brandi Gilbert: The second is active listening, so I know you and Amy were talking about how, like, as an evaluator, we’re not… we don’t always have, like, the full mental health training, but we can listen with intention, and I would say that something that our profession has trained us on, whether it’s storytelling or any data collection method, is, like, how do you listen with intention?

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Brandi Gilbert: How do you build relationship? Even just…

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Brandi Gilbert: building rapport, and asking people not to, just sort of jump in. Like, for instance, one question we use is, like, what’s something that you love about living here? And then even our team had pointed out, like, what if… what if they say they don’t love anything? Or, you know, what if they say something extreme? It’s like, you say nothing. You just lean into, and you allow for them to say, like, this is, you know, this is their thoughts.

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Brandi Gilbert: So that was one of our, like, warm-ups with young people. So you listen with intention, you listen without judgment, and we found that when we do that.

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Brandi Gilbert: A lot of people have said to us, like, it’s actually a release to be here, to have this space. Even for people who have had,

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Brandi Gilbert: sort of mental health support that they might say is just, like, a different place to sit and think, and nobody is judging them, and so they are open to that, to sharing their story. Third, I would say, is warm handoffs. So, instead of just thinking, like, what could happen here, we try to plan with intention for what that means.

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Brandi Gilbert: So, and I don’t just say, like, warm hand off lightly, I even mean, like, literally, physically having somebody in the building if you are, like, in an in-person setting, or virtually having somebody around who may be, like, connected to the program that you’re serving, or may be able to provide, sort of, outsourced mental health, maybe that’s a list. My favorite is, like, if you are in person, to have that person sort of standing by, even if they’re just doing their work.

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Brandi Gilbert: work, seeing clients, whatever it is, but to know that someone is near. And so if there is a connection needed to a service or to process more what’s happened in the interview, literally, you stand up, ask the person if it’s okay if we walk over, and you, like, literally do a warm handoff, not just, like.

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Brandi Gilbert: In the, you know, saying the words.

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Brandi Gilbert: And then lastly, just thinking about how you share back. Some of the questions in the queue were about how you share the stories, and so how you might have people who had their stories with you, or, like, advisory committees, or those types of things.

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Brandi Gilbert: be involved in sharing the story. So we’ve done data walks, for instance, where young people who have shared their stories have also been involved in what does the narrative look like?

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Brandi Gilbert: when you then take those stories and retell and also share it back in spaces and show how it matters and how it’s used. And then lastly, outside of the tips, I would just say, too, sort of, like, aside, one is just hope, that sometimes when we think about storytelling, we’re, like, indexing for

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Brandi Gilbert: trauma’s gonna come up, trauma’s gonna come up, but the other thing that I’ve heard a lot of is hope, and I’ve heard some of the most challenging stories, but there’s still, when you ask that person, like, what they’re looking forward to next, or what they want to build for themselves and their family and their community, they always have an answer. There’s always a thing that they are hoping for.

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Brandi Gilbert: And last but not least is to slow down! I have found in our work, when we’re being intentional, sometimes it doesn’t move as fast as you want to, even to the point where I have, like, a specific example where we were working on a project, and we were collecting many stories.

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Brandi Gilbert: Around, sort of, systems engagement, there was a lot of discussion of trauma, and it was taking longer to have people, like, tell those stories, and to even recruit them and have people who were willing to. And we weren’t going to make the final report.

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Brandi Gilbert: And we just had to have a hard conversation with our client and say, like, it’s not going to happen, but we know you want to be intentional. And actually, like, they didn’t say, that’s okay. They said, we still need something, so what will you do for us? And that’s how we got to, like, okay, there’s gonna be a preliminary brief, and it will have these things, and there’s gonna be a final, so it’s like, how do you meet in the middle? Because it’s not just always okay to say, like, okay, you’re being intentional, so…

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Brandi Gilbert: Take the time you need! So, like, how do you meet in the middle? Because those stories are always serving a purpose, too, and we don’t want to miss the mark, and sometimes that mark is a timed mark.

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Anna Ghosh: Wow, thanks, Brandi. You’ve offered so many tips from all your experiences. Thanks for, you know, kind of categorizing them so that they’re really great takeaways.

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Anna Ghosh: We’ll probably have questions on specifics. I know a lot of people are interested in the real specifics, you know, but I know that a lot of it is just take care, and

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Anna Ghosh: Do, you know, do it intentionally, like you’re saying. Sometimes you don’t know all the things that you’re going to do, but to pay attention, like, all the things you said to pay attention to.

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Brandi Gilbert: Yeah, but you can start to think about what those could be, and then plan accordingly.

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Anna Ghosh: Sometimes you use.

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Brandi Gilbert: those plans, and sometimes you don’t. That’s what I love about being intentional.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, to think of it ahead.

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Community Science: Hey, Anna, before you go on, there’s a question here that I think, is very relevant to what Brandy just said, so we could ask this question quickly. What’s a warm hand… what does a warm handoff look like virtually, Brandi, in a virtual.

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Brandi Gilbert: Okay, so we did do… we have done warm handoffs virtually, and I would say it involves a two-step… ideally, it would involve a two-step process. So one is, like, some note over to that person with any context, or, like, things that you might not feel as comfortable sharing in, like, the general note to get things ready, and then it also involves, a note with the person, whether that’s email, and also recognizing that sometimes email is not the right thing.

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Brandi Gilbert: Maybe it’s text.

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Brandi Gilbert: And ideally, I will say we haven’t always had enough, sort of, space and budget to do this follow-through, but I do believe that a good warm handoff, like, if you’re able to follow it out, might also mean some follow-up, just checking, having a person on the team check on, like, do you still need anything? Do you need another warm handoff? Or making sure, maybe, the handoff that you provide, that they might be able to follow through longer.

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Anna Ghosh: Thank you. Yeah. Yeah, thanks.

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Anna Ghosh: Ken, I was wondering if you can talk a little bit about the cultural relevance. And, you know, often we think about, we’re going to get people together, and from an evaluation perspective, it’s often, like, we’ll get a whole community that’s homogenous together, it might be

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Anna Ghosh: you know, as Brandi’s saying, more safe, and also it might be the kind of data point that we need about that particular community. So we gather them together, and we might have a facilitator who’s culturally aligned, or have translation.

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Anna Ghosh: But I think this is a nuanced…

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Anna Ghosh: question, is that the right way? What else comes up in terms of when you bring people together and you think about culture?

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Community Science: So, you know, specifically with storytelling.

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Community Science: you know, you boasted this, Amy and Anna. I think what comes up for me is…

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Community Science: you know, what is the culture of storytelling in… for that particular person and their background? So, anyone else listening to you say, you know, how you told your story, and then how it kind of opens the door for others to share their stories, and how then it leads to other parts of your story, and it just builds on it.

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Community Science: my immediate reaction was a little bit like Anna’s, who’s like, well, you know, I know that when I asked, you know, a family member to go join a support group, because they, as part of, caregivers of people who have serious illnesses.

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Community Science: That person was very uncomfortable, right? Because the culture is not to share these stories with people you don’t know, and that person’s family members were also a little indignant about it. It’s like, well, why does that person need to go share stories with other strangers? We’re here, we’re the siblings.

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Community Science: So I think there’s… that’s kind of where the challenge comes up, and I think that happens whether it’s in an evaluation setting, or whether it’s just in a healing setting, where you’re changing stories.

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Community Science: I thought about this a lot, because to me, I know that storytelling is an integral part of every culture, especially when cultures that are more orally oriented, all stories play such an important part.

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Community Science: And I think it came down to this after reading a little bit more about it. It’s sort of…

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Community Science: While storytelling is a tradition in almost every culture, it’s sort of…

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Community Science: The nuances are, who gets to tell the story.

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Community Science: What is the story… what is the listener’s response to the storyteller?

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Community Science: What is… what are parts of the story that’s more… that’s being centered, right? So… so in some cultures, maybe the story is the person, but in others, it might be the community, or the context, or the history. What parts of the stories get emphasized?

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Community Science: And that is where the cultural nuances, I think, come in.

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Community Science: And for me, as a researcher, as an evaluator, what I ask then is, like, am I interpreting that story correctly? If I don’t share that person’s culture, am I interpreting it correctly?

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Community Science: even if I share that person’s culture, do I have blinders on? And I’m not seeing it from another angle. So, to me, I think those are the nuances we really have to think about. And then there’s also this part where I started to realize… we use the word storytelling a lot.

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Community Science: And it’s one of those words, to me, nowadays, it’s like community. We throw it out there, we think we all know what it means, but do we really? And so there’s the storytelling for the purpose of, sort of, healing.

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Community Science: For the purpose of finding community, a little bit like what you and Amy were talking about, Anna. Then there’s using interviews and focus groups to collect stories for evaluation.

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Community Science: And that’s a different kind of storytelling. The difference between the two is that in the evaluation, there’s an inquiry process. You have an inquiry process and a set of questions that’s really driving

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Community Science: the stories you want to hear, whereas in the storytelling, for more healing purposes and a community purpose, it’s a little bit more open-ended.

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Community Science: And it doesn’t always have that line of inquiry that’s structured or even semi-structured. And you can also use different methods. So, you can use art, you can use photos, you can to tell stories, whereas in the evaluation, it’s a little bit more limiting.

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Community Science: Not to say that it can’t cross over, but I do think we have to be really…

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Community Science: cognizant about the purpose of the stories that were… and the storytelling, both the product of it, as well as the process of it, its purpose. And then how do we go about shaping it?

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Community Science: But I think one of the most important things that Brandy brought up, and you brought up to Anna from the questions, is I will say that we’re not trained to do these things. I mean, we’re trained to collect data. We’re not trained to, when there’s a trauma in the room, from the person sharing that story as part of our data collection.

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Community Science: How do we respond? So I think that’s where…

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Community Science: I worry about how much of it becomes an evaluation method, and how well are we as evaluators really prepared to use this method in a way that is ethical.

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Community Science: And that cares for the stories.

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Brandi Gilbert: I would just add there, Kian, too, also where we can build on lessons around trauma-informed data collection. So it’s like, we’re sort of, like, not naturally trained, but there is this growing literature, and, like, our team has used that a lot, where there are… there are a set of best practices.

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Brandi Gilbert: around trauma-informed data collection, and it’s not the same thing, like, I get what you’re saying, but what does that look like, and how could we also invoke those practices? And train our teams, too. I mean, that’s one thing that we haven’t talked about, is, the intention not only that we hold with the storytellers, but with the teams who are, like, hearing lots of information and processing it themselves, as well as analyzing it.

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Community Science: Yeah, and what comes to mind for me, too, is I wonder if there’s a balance, you know, evaluators have, like you’re saying, sort of a.

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Anna Ghosh: you know, an area of inquiry, and there’s a purpose to why they’re asking questions. But if we’re to kind of meld the, you know, our role to also be, we’re here, we’re hearing stories.

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Anna Ghosh: Can we do it in a broader way?

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Anna Ghosh: And…

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Anna Ghosh: and acknowledge that, that, you know, we’re going to be using some of the information in this way, and… but we want you to be able to tell your story the way you want to tell it, not the way we want to ask it and document it. So it comes… I think the ask might be different in the…

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Anna Ghosh: The format might be different, and maybe, being honest about.

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Community Science: What the process is going to be, and why.

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Anna Ghosh: But I just feel like, yeah.

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Anna Ghosh: as a valuation practitioner, I’ve always been, you know, my training was to… how do you be objective? How do you stay distant? And now I’m more…

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Anna Ghosh: interested in how do I be more human in these spaces? How do I care more? How do I do things not just for,

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Anna Ghosh: you know, just… just maintaining the… the rigor or the method. It’s more about, what can I do to help create healthier communities as well, healthier people? And can… can those two be…

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Anna Ghosh: Can those two mix?

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Anna Ghosh: No.

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Community Science: Yeah.

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Brandi Gilbert: Yeah, sure.

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Anna Ghosh: No.

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Community Science: There’s a question in the chat that’s relevant to this right now. Can you recommend some resources, like training, certifications, or anything else in trauma-informed data collection?

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Community Science: We know any…

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Brandi Gilbert: We did send them out as a follow-up as our resources. I know that’s something that we do after every webinar. Our team has kind of combed through different ones and, used some existing guides, and then we take it and build it as our own for each project. Like, how is it relevant? How might it look different based on where we’re going? Are we virtual in person? What is the community like? What are the questions of inquiry? So I can, take that.

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Brandi Gilbert: As a… as a follow-up, for sure.

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Brandi Gilbert: I will say, like, I don’t have, like, a go-to, like, you know how some things there is, like, this is the standard. It’s not like that. It’s more we’ve used what’s out there, and that’s helped to probe our thinking, and also, do a training process with our teams, which is usually at least a one-to-two part sort of, okay, here’s our guide, but here’s how we are going to show up, in community and as a team.

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Anna Ghosh: And I’ll just offer that, some of my training, although it’s been very, you know, stay objective.

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Anna Ghosh: I did work with a psychologist on a project, and I did receive training that, you know, I was lucky enough that my project

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Anna Ghosh: had that expertise, that I was somewhat trained through a psychologist to

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Anna Ghosh: you know, how do I even maintain my composure or my emotions? How do I react appropriately? You know, what to anticipate, things like that, so that

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Anna Ghosh: So that I’m able to hold a space a little bit better for the person, and for myself, to be honest.

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Anna Ghosh: Because it is… we are in relationship, even when we are doing this role.

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Community Science: Yeah, I’ll never forget a class I took, in grad school, and the professor actually… it was a counseling class, but it was very interesting, because those skills really applied to being an interviewer, and they recorded us, and then they made us watch the tape of ourselves.

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Community Science: And it was just very funny, like, you don’t realize it in the moment, but one of the things was your facial expression. So when you kind of, you know, express shock at listening to something, you’re being judgmental. And so, like, those things that you don’t realize you’re doing, but getting that kind of training is very helpful as an evaluator.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, absolutely. I was thinking, coming into this conversation about times when I’ve been asked to share my story, and someone’s checked their watch. And just that little moment where they’re not present, or they’ve…

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Anna Ghosh: you know, sort of glanced away as if they’re, you know, to me it indicated, oh, you’re bored by my experience and what I think is really vulnerable.

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Anna Ghosh: And so then there’s that click shutdown, and which then again, you know, really goes the opposite direction of, you know, feeling even more isolated in feeling more closed up to being able to talk. So even those little things, like you’re saying, can…

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Anna Ghosh: Just being present is so important.

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Brandi Gilbert: add Anna there that, like, as far as the nuts and bolts, logistically, that that takes work, because that means, that someone else is keeping track of the time. Also, like, we found that, just, like, a specific, like, practical tip is.

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Brandi Gilbert: Running in teams of three, because you might have two interviewers, one at each time, like, even in separate rooms, but you have a third person rotating through. So that means if it is a time somebody, you know, the hour’s over, they’re still telling their story, like, it seems intense, someone else is popping in, or someone else is coming in to give an interviewer break, so they’re not having to go back-to-back. So I would say, like, we all want that intentionality, but what I’ve learned is, like, it takes time.

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Brandi Gilbert: It takes planning on the budget of, like, what team to bring and how that team moves through, even taking people and passing people off and wrapping up, those kinds of things.

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Anna Ghosh: And yeah, and I guess not expecting things, it sounds like, just to always go smoothly, just planning for, you know, all of that backup and surrounding support that you need to do it well, because you care, and it sounds like you really do.

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Brandi Gilbert: Yeah, and the extra person power, I found, really helps that. To be more human, sometimes you need more people than, you plan for, is a lesson that I’ve learned.

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Anna Ghosh: yeah, thanks for sharing that.

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Anna Ghosh: So I’m hearing, you know, some of the comments I’m hearing is just, you know, that feeling of being validated, and what that is to the relationship of opening up to

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Anna Ghosh: getting care, getting services, even in this evaluation setting, that it can open up to a referral or to a warm handoff, like you were saying, Brandi. And then just acknowledging that

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Anna Ghosh: people in these spaces are going to have different readiness, to share, which doesn’t mean that what you’re collecting is… is the full story, so we don’t know how much of

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Anna Ghosh: people’s story they… they haven’t shared, and to kind of acknowledge that everyone’s on this path, and we can do the best we can to make it a space for sharing,

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Anna Ghosh: But not everyone’s going to be there because of all the different factors we talked about that they’re bringing into that space and fear, of sharing and the repercussions it might mean for them. And like Amy brought up, it was like, as a society, we’re not always…

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Anna Ghosh: Really the best at, having that empathy and care for people when they are vulnerable.

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Anna Ghosh: And then just…

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Anna Ghosh: you know, spending time, Brandy, what you talked about, setting up the space, all that, you know, forethought that you put into how are we going to go into it? And I’m thinking even, you know, we’re familiar now with our virtual spaces, and when we go to a physical space, we might be in a totally new physical space that we’ve never been in.

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Anna Ghosh: And I’m sure you’ve encountered that, and how important it might be to go check that space out, and…

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Anna Ghosh: And spend the time ahead of,

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Anna Ghosh: Ahead of that time when you’re inviting others in. Were you gonna say something about that, Brandi?

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Brandi Gilbert: Yeah, no, I was just agreeing, or at least have conversation about the space with others who are in the space and can give you more of that sense.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, that makes total sense. And then, yeah, spending all that.

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Anna Ghosh: you know, having enough time for people to tell their story, so you might be like, we have this one hour, but that’s not necessarily the time that everyone has, you know, allocated to really fully share their story, and how can we be flexible in creating that time.

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Brandi Gilbert: Even in the virtual space now, too, because then you have other people who might be around, and that’s when the storytelling, the logistics could be even more complex, because a person might not feel comfortable, and then they’re in a different surrounding venue, like, it might not be a private one-on-one space.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, that’s true. Have you had to prep people to say, you know, here’s what you might want to think about for your space when you’re coming into…

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Anna Ghosh: this discussion?

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Brandi Gilbert: We have, but I still find it challenging, like, the use of the camera and whether a person feels comfortable, whether they even feel comfortable with somebody seeing their surroundings, so…

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Brandi Gilbert: I’ve had better experience doing it in person, but I know, you know, that’s challenging, even now where we’re moving more to a virtual world, and even more budget constraints on evaluations, you know.

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Anna Ghosh: Right, yeah.

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Brandi Gilbert: right now.

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Anna Ghosh: Right, right, yeah. Yeah, some things are… are just different when you’re virtual than you can have, like, actual walls and, you know, you’re in a different space than…

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Anna Ghosh: The virtual space.

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Anna Ghosh: And also, you know, in terms of something…

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Anna Ghosh: that’s coming up for me is just, you know, Ken, what you’re talking about is just…

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Anna Ghosh: how do you let people tell their stories, and how do we not go in with, okay, here’s question one, here’s question two, here’s question three? Which often we’re trained to say, here’s our discussion guide, and we stick to the protocol, right?

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Anna Ghosh: But people can’t really share their full story just by answering the questions.

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Community Science: Correct, and interestingly you said that, because there’s a question in the chat about what if a storyteller keeps sharing stories that are outside, quote-unquote.

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Anna Ghosh: Of your inquiry, evaluation.

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Community Science: Question. And you have limited time for that.

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Community Science: interview with that person. How do you balance? How do you resolve?

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, I think it’s a… it’s a dilemma. You could have the…

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Anna Ghosh: The two, the people who don’t share, and then the people who want to share a lot.

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Anna Ghosh: And how do you balance and keep people, you know, at the… at that right amount?

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Anna Ghosh: You know, sometimes I think it is a little, you know, listening and validating, and then also saying, you know, we can also talk about the, you know, there might be another space to talk about this further. Not to cut it off, but to… to say, let’s… to be continued, or let’s continue, or can I find you someone else to talk about?

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Community Science: Yeah, and…

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Community Science: I think this is a great question, also, not just for evaluation, but, like, even in circles that storytelling is for the purpose of healing, and I would love to hear what Amy has to say. As the evaluator, I mean, similar to what Brandi had just said, like, you just make sure you have enough time on the back end, and you’re not scheduling those interviews back-to-back, but, like, giving yourself plenty of room in the back end.

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Community Science: Not only just so in case someone does kind of go outside of what you’re asking for and have more to share, but you also need time to decompress a little bit in between, because you’re hearing different stories. So even as the person collecting the information, there is that need to just sort of

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Community Science: process it, and then get ready, right, for the next interview, if you’re doing them several in a day.

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Community Science: But I also think it’s… it’s important to be clear about setting those expectations ahead of time, of what’s the… what’s the information you’re hoping to get off the person, like, being clear on that. And then,

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Community Science: once you’ve set those expectations, you’re listening, but then if it runs out, and the person’s going outside and telling stories outside of what you really need, I mean, you do need to have those skills to reflect and then bring the person back and redirect that person back to your line of inquiry. I mean, as part of… that’s an interviewing technique, right, that we all

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Community Science: Need to have, which overlaps with…

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Community Science: the storytelling as a methodology, as a process, but I’d be curious, Amy, like, you know, when you’ve had experiences of people sharing stories as part… not as part of an evaluation, but just as part of storytelling, and someone takes up more ad space than you anticipate, what do you do?

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Amy Moffett: Yeah, I mean, I think it’s hard to tell a linear story, and I think it’s… when you first start telling your story, it’s gonna take a while.

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Amy Moffett: Because it’s new, and it’s raw, and it feels good to take off that itchy sweater, right, that you’ve been wearing around that was this untold story. If someone asked me something today, I could… I could do it in 10 words versus the 1,000 words from 10 years ago, but…

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Amy Moffett: that is a… that is a really difficult dance to do when you want to hear what someone’s talking about, especially if they’re new to sharing that. I would say if it’s… if at all possible, just acknowledging up front

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Amy Moffett: You know, what you’re talking about is big and broad and hard, and we’d love for you to be able to focus on this particular piece of it.

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Amy Moffett: And as you were talking, I had, you know, speaking of extremes, there’s some folks that feel very comfortable talking about their specific diagnosis, their specific treatment, their, you know, their counseling, their history, where

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Amy Moffett: for me, personally, I never wanted to be the face of my…

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Amy Moffett: mental illness, it doesn’t even matter what my diagnosis is. That becomes irrelevant, because I think there’s so much universal experience for any type of mental illness. Not across the board, but

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Amy Moffett: I didn’t want to be the expert.

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Amy Moffett: on what I was diagnosed with. That… I’m not qualified to do that either. So, I think that has to be communicated somehow of, we’re looking for a story specifically about bipolar disorder or anxiety, versus we’re looking for… to hear your story about what was it like to enter treatment.

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Amy Moffett: So those are questions I’ve been asked. Those are very different things.

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Amy Moffett: I think just setting those expectations and… and then building in a buffer when you can, knowing that

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Amy Moffett: People new to storytelling need a little bit more time.

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Community Science: What you’re saying makes me think about the prep work that we always have to put into it.

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Community Science: Right? And that’s the same of whether you’re using storytelling as a method for healing or for evaluation, like, getting as many heads around the table to kind of say, okay, we’re gonna go do this. Now, what if this happens? What if that happens? And going through all the different possible scenarios to then know, okay, how are we going to handle that situation when it comes up? And that’s sort of the homework we have to do, and the prep we have to do ahead of

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Community Science: the time.

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Community Science: That’s very intentional.

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Amy Moffett: Yeah.

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Anna Ghosh: Oh, was there another question?

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Community Science: Yeah, actually, there’s lots of questions.

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Anna Ghosh: It does.

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Community Science: Have any of you experienced… have any of you had experiences where you decided not to collect stories after assessing a specific situation?

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Community Science: So, for example, I work with the immigrant Spanish-speaking community, and I decided not to conduct, I guess, focus groups?

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Community Science: I’m not sure what FGD stands for, in the beginning of the year, shortly after the administration change.

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Community Science: We opted for a survey instead because we felt the collective feel was so intense in the current moment.

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Community Science: We did not feel that we had the resources to support what people really needed in that moment.

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Community Science: Yeah, any of you had that experience?

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Brandi Gilbert: I have one. When we, we’ve been doing an evaluation with the, juvenile justice, like, an early engagement and prevention around the justice system, and when we decided methods, we went for youth focus groups rather than storytelling, because of the caution that it could be, like, our other project that I mentioned where young people would be telling these really deep stories about, like, juvenile justice, criminal justice. We didn’t want that, because it was more about

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Brandi Gilbert: the program. But we know by having experience in the criminal justice and juvenile justice system, you could likely have… and they were 14 to, 14 to 17 year olds. So we know, like, if someone already has that experience at that age, they likely do have, like, a story to tell. But we wanted to be careful to collect information that was about the program, because this evaluation was really about the services. So instead, we did have a pivot.

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Brandi Gilbert: where we had focus groups, and we said, like, you don’t have to tell your story here. Actually, it could even be, like, what do you observe about this program? How do you think other people find it helpful? What would you tell somebody, about what this program was about? We even use purposely, we use situational questions. If this person had this situation, you know, what would they come to this program for? Do you think this program would be helpful? So we veered away from storytelling in a place where

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Brandi Gilbert: So we knew we didn’t have the time, support, and I would say most, important, we didn’t think it would be helpful to drive the evaluation, so we don’t want people to focus on telling those stories and, risk re-traumatizing.

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Community Science: Hmm.

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Anna Ghosh: Bye.

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Community Science: Anna, any experience from you on that?

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Anna Ghosh: I haven’t had any experience with that in particular. I could imagine it coming up, but I haven’t had experience with it. But those are good tips, Brandi.

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Anna Ghosh: I was also thinking, I don’t know if anyone’s asked these questions, but I know in some of the registrants were asking, you know, what… what about sharing the…

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Anna Ghosh: the… the stories afterwards. And so… so we’re talking about the process of collecting, but we also need to be up front with people about how are we going to, share out those stories. And one is sometimes it’s…

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Anna Ghosh: you know, we want to honor that they spent all this time telling us information and stories, and sometimes more than what we anticipated, but now that we have it, what do we, you know, how do we honor, bringing that to light? And then, on the other hand, sometimes it’s

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Anna Ghosh: you know, in the process of sharing, like you’re saying, Amy, sometimes it does take the thousand words, but maybe it’s only the 10 that they want shared out. But it took… it was that process to get there.

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Anna Ghosh: So, so imagine that there’s, you know… we always… we always talk about consent, but…

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Anna Ghosh: I don’t know that we’ve always…

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Anna Ghosh: Been that explicit, or there is a way to… to…

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Anna Ghosh: To be even more intentional when we ask for consent and talk about the purpose and how information will be used.

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Brandi Gilbert: Precious.

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Community Science: Another question is that,

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Community Science: Can storytelling be embedded in a focus group discussion, or are they two distinct methods?

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Community Science: Yeah.

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Brandi Gilbert: GC1.

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Community Science: I’ll go… I’ll say what I said in the beginning. I definitely want you all to, share your responses and thoughts. Like, I mean, when I was looking into storytelling,

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Community Science: Storytelling as a methodology is more open-ended.

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Community Science: It’s more of a co-creation process with the person who’s listening and collecting those stories.

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Community Science: And that storytelling can be… can be virtual, I mean, can be visual, can be art, can be verbal, can be written, and the… and it’s less… and the… and I think the analysis is a little bit more open-ended and

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Community Science: co-created with the people who are telling the stories, whereas if you use storytelling as a method in the evaluation.

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Community Science: there is…

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Community Science: there is, sort of the… the agenda’s driven by the evaluator and the researcher, based on what they need to know. They’re analyzing it.

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Community Science: it isn’t so open-ended, like, that not so many different forms of storytelling is allowed, because it can make the analysis way too messy. So… so, from what I understand, there are distinct methods in terms of their purpose.

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Community Science: what do you do with the information, and how do you go about interpreting the information? They are distinct.

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Community Science: But open to curious to see what you all think.

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Brandi Gilbert: I agree. I mean, to me, the main difference is, the caution around confidentiality in a focus group. I always want to be careful that we’re making, a lot of times, making agreement that what we say stays here, but…

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Brandi Gilbert: we don’t know that it will stay there, so do people have, like, the time, the space, the confidentiality, to tell their story in a focus group? And I think, depending on what the topic is, there could be space, or that could be kind of limiting.

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Community Science: Yeah.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, and it’s… it’s just making, you know, this whole conversation’s making me think about… we put in a lot of time up front,

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Anna Ghosh: to plan out how, you know, what we will do, and then afterwards, there… we could be spending just as much time afterwards, to… to… to keep engaged with the people.

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Anna Ghosh: Who share their stories to talk about what… how we’ll use it, what we’ll do with the information, and what they think

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Anna Ghosh: Or even the pieces of information that are worth…

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Anna Ghosh: sharing out versus keeping, you know, confidential, so maybe there’s more processing. It just doesn’t end at the end of that focus group. It continues on, and there’s still negotiation as a group in terms of what, you know, because we don’t know… a group never knows what’s going to happen within the group.

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Anna Ghosh: Until… until they get together. But to talk about it again afterwards, and to create that space.

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Community Science: Let’s see, someone just asked.

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Community Science: Do you create or prepare spaces differently for young people or for youth versus with adults?

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Brandi Gilbert: There’s a lot of similarities to those. Parent consent is one big thing when dealing with young people that, you’re having to consider in creating the space and making sure that young people have that consent, but also they give their own assent. But otherwise, I would say, holding the same intentionality, that you hold for youth as for adults, just some of the issues might be

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Brandi Gilbert: be a little bit different, like, what you hold intentionality around.

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Community Science: Hmm.

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Anna Ghosh: Brady, I remember you saying in the past about, you know, what… the relationship between youth and adults, and how you need to care for what comes up in terms of,

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Anna Ghosh: the questions you ask, and the discussions you have, and what that means for that relationship. Can you talk about that a little bit?

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Brandi Gilbert: Yeah, for sure. There is a youth-adult, power construct, too, and I would say that’s a construct in general, even if it’s not just youth-adult, but just, like, how do we hold people well? We know that research and evaluation has historically, done harm in some places, so how do you make it an open place and, like, hold people’s stories well? How do you make consent open? Even some of the nuts and bolts, like.

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Brandi Gilbert: There was a question, I answered it by typing, but about, like, not judging, and really that it’s not about not having a reaction at all, but it’s making sure that your reaction is not judging. So we can still show vulnerability, we can still have reactions, but especially when you have a power dynamic, whether it’s youth, adult, or other ones, like, that’s part of how you hold that well.

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Anna Ghosh: And recognize what the dynamic is.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, you bring up this up.

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Community Science: Anna, I didn’t mean to interrupt, but I know we only have a few minutes left, and I noticed that there are two participants whose hands.

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Anna Ghosh: Keep going up.

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Community Science: And I don’t know… I know Zoom sometimes has its own mind, right? You don’t touch anything and suddenly your hands go up, or something goes on, so I reckon, I just want to check, but then I also know some people are more comfortable verbalizing their question than typing it, so…

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Community Science: I’m going to ask, I’m gonna open the mic for somebody to speak.

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Community Science: And see if… Elizabeth, if you have a question you’d rather verbalize than type?

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Community Science: Or if your hand was… or Zoom had its… or Zoom was putting up your hand for you without you knowing it.

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Community Science: So I… I’ve…

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Community Science: I’m trying to… I think I…

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Elizabeth Mago: Sorry to assume that I was doing that, I don’t know how that happened, but thank you.

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Community Science: Okay, no problem. That’s what I was wondering, because Zoom does that every now and then. Okay, just want to be respectful of that, and I think…

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Community Science: Let me see the other person. Hitomi, I think you had the same thing, so just want to check.

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Hitomi Yoshida: No, no, that… I’m sorry, that was… Okay.

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Community Science: Alright, so Zoom is having its own, own, own mine around here, that’s cool. Alright, we’ll just continue then. So sorry, Anna, I think you were gonna say something, and I interrupted you.

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Anna Ghosh: Oh, I was gonna, I was gonna, Brandy, you mentioned the power dynamic, and I think that’s an important…

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Anna Ghosh: point, and we’re sort of touched on it, is just that

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Anna Ghosh: you know, as evaluators, we’re coming in with the questions, and there is a power dynamic inherent in terms of we’re also… we hold the information, ultimately. We’re the ones taking all the notes and… and probably writing it up. But I was also thinking about that, you know, that’s…

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Anna Ghosh: That’s a whole, whole realm of,

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Anna Ghosh: practice that we need to consider, but I was thinking even in the conversation, is that power dynamic we might have, where people

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Anna Ghosh: In a group setting or individual setting might want to just say what the questioner, the facilitator of that group is… is bringing up, and then

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Anna Ghosh: And how…

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Anna Ghosh: That person as an evaluator can even share a little bit and be a little bit more vulnerable in that space.

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Anna Ghosh: to, share, you know, I don’t know what the just the right amount is, but there’s probably the right amount.

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Anna Ghosh: To share about yourself, so that, so that… so that it does sort of create that space where people can share openly.

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Anna Ghosh: Brandy, you are nodding, so…

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Brandi Gilbert: Yeah, no, just an agreement. There is that fine line of what you can share and where there’s common, you know, where there are commonalities. Like, I’m a mom, and that’s a commonality that I sometimes share. So it just depends on what you feel comfortable with and, you know, where that line might be.

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Anna Ghosh: And Amy, did you have any thoughts on that? Has that come up for you, and what helps you to open up versus not what you’ve seen other people experience?

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Amy Moffett: Yeah, I mean, personally, I do try to read a room if, you know, you’re presenting with other people, or just in a…

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Amy Moffett: other contexts and say, who… who probably hasn’t ever shared their story? And you can tell they’re kind of…

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Amy Moffett: ready… ready to get it out, and… and sort of figuring… figuring that out and giving them that space. I… I do think, even for me as a non-evaluator, and just kind of out in the world.

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Amy Moffett: It’s… it’s tempting to all of us to say, you know what, I had that too, and you know what worked for me?

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Amy Moffett: Or I went through that too, and you know what worked for me, and that’s wonderful, but… but certain things are so personal, and I’ve been… I’ve had really privileged access to care. Once I let myself go out and get it, I had it. And not everybody has that, and so it’s… it’s…

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Amy Moffett: having, you know, and again, speaking my personal experience, any type of mental illness, it doesn’t make me the expert on anything, and I’ve had to really check myself and say, you know what? Worked for me.

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Amy Moffett: And may not work for everybody, and I’m just here to listen. So, it’s hard not to do that. I run into that as well.

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Anna Ghosh: yeah, we’re all humans in this space.

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Amy Moffett: Yeah, it’s not always helpful. You may think you’re being helpful, but it really isn’t always helpful.

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Anna Ghosh: Yeah, thanks for sharing that.

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Anna Ghosh: So I see where our hour has passed quite quickly, and I knew we’d have a lot to talk about.

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Anna Ghosh: And it looks like, yeah, Ken, you’re sharing an article. Thank you for that. I feel like we have many more topics to talk about related, and we’re gonna just try to keep the conversation going. Reach out, anyone, if you want to talk with us, we’re here, and we…

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Anna Ghosh: are glad we’ve opened up the conversation today. Thank you, panelists. Thanks, everyone, for being here today.