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Portland, Maine

Public health researchers from UNE present at national evaluation conference

Pamela Bruno (left) and Colleen Fuller from UNE's Center from Excellence in Public Health pose for a photo next to a slideshow presentation displayed on a screen
From left: Pamela Bruno, M.P.H., and Colleen Fuller, M.P.H., recently led a workshop on inclusive communication at the American Evaluation Association annual meeting in Indianapolis.

Maine SNAP-Ed evaluators Pamela Bruno, M.P.H., and Colleen Fuller, M.P.H., from UNE’s Center for Excellence in Public Health (CEPH) led a workshop on inclusive communication at the American Evaluation Association (AEA) annual meeting, held in Indianapolis from Oct. 9–14.

The conference theme was “The Power of Story in Evaluation.” Practitioners from around the globe convened to share ideas, network, and build skills around creating evaluation narratives. The CEPH team joined with SNAP-Ed colleagues from South Carolina, Missouri, and North Carolina to lead a skill-building workshop entitled “Asset-Framing and Ethical Storytelling: A Practical Workshop to Advance Equity through Inclusive Narrative.”

Presenters shared the key principles of asset-framing and ethical storytelling, emphasizing tangible ways to incorporate these principles into intervention implementation, evaluation, and reporting, so that the narratives we tell as program implementers are accurate, aspirational, and respect the dignity of communities.

The presenters defined and shared key equity concepts as developed by Trabian Shorters, thought leader and creator of the Asset-Framing cognitive framework, and Rachel Goble, chief executive officer of The Freedom Story and a co-curator of the website for Ethical Storytelling, a community of nonprofit practitioners a storytellers.

The workshop covered data-sharing approaches that reinforce principles of inclusion and equity, using real-world examples for practical application. Attendees were instructed on how to reflect on their own positionality, release power to the storyteller, and lift up community voices while working to reduce stigma.

Additionally, a newly developed toolkit authored by the presenters, “Ethical Storytelling & Asset-Framing: A Toolkit for Centering Equity when Communicating Programmatic Success,” was released in conjunction with the workshop. The toolkit presents a curated set of ethical storytelling and asset-framing resources to support inclusive communication practices for practitioners and evaluators.

About the University of New England

The University of New England is Maine’s largest independent university, with two beautiful coastal campuses in Maine, a one-of-a-kind study abroad campus in Tangier, Morocco, and an array of flexible, accredited online degrees. In an uncommonly welcoming and supportive community, we offer hands-on learning, empowering students to make a positive impact in a world full of challenges. The state’s top provider of health professionals, we are home to Maine’s only medical college, Maine’s only dental college, a variety of other interprofessionally aligned health care degree programs, as well as nationally recognized programs for marine science degrees, natural and social sciences degrees, arts and humanities degrees, and business degrees.