Celebrating the Difference We Make : Self-Evaluation Week 2026
This week (May 18 – 22) is Self-Evaluation Week, a national campaign launched by Evaluation Support Scotland (ESS) to celebrate the difference organisations make and to share learning about impact and evaluation.
To mark their 21st anniversary, ESS are inviting organisations across Scotland to take a moment to reflect, learn, and celebrate.
Why Evaluation Matters
Monitoring & evaluation can often slip to the bottom of the to-do list. Many charities and community groups are constantly fire-fighting – responding to day-to-day needs of projects, service users, and volunteers.
Evaluation can end up being put on the backburner until when a funder report is due, or vaguely mentioned in funding applications without much time to plan outcomes & indicators. But effective monitoring & evaluation is hugely valuable to ensuring the success and sustainability of your projects.
Evaluation Support Scotland (ESS) specialise in helping third sector organisations build evaluation into everyday practice, using approaches that involve the people you support and focus on learning, not box-ticking. Their website is a treasure trove of practical tools, examples, and learning resources for organisations at all stages.
Our Work on Collective Evaluation in Midlothian
As part of our work as a community planning partner, MCA worked with Evaluation Support Scotland (ESS), Midlothian Council’s Communities, Lifelong Learning and Employability team, and local partners to improve collective evaluation across Community Learning and Development (CLD).
The project focused on volunteering as a test case, recognising that volunteer-involving organisations often lack capacity to measure volunteer impact specifically, prioritising service outcomes as required for reporting.
Together we developed shared tools including:
- a joint logic model
- a Midlothian-wide volunteer satisfaction survey
- a simple evaluation plan and guidance
- a practical case study template for local organisations
You can read more about the approach, learning, and outcomes in our case study below: