Ripple Effects Mapping (REM) is a participatory story-based evaluation method developed by national Cooperative Extension professionals that captures the broader (community or region-wide) impacts of a major program. It is new to Kentucky, but Nicole Breazeale is working hard to facilitate REM and expand the capacity of practitioners and academics to conduct this highly energizing process. 

Since Nicole began her REM program in 2020, she has facilitated 14 REM sessions for community-based organizations, including 5 Extension groups, 3 community leadership development programs, 3 local food justice organizations, and 2 economic development programs, and 1 health collaborative. Each of these evaluations involved between 10-40 participants. Another 5 REM evaluations are scheduled for Fall 2024. 

To raise the profile of this method within the state, Nicole offered an early “train-the-trainer” in 2021 that was attended by 18 participants, all of whom had participated in one of her previous REM sessions. In 2023, Nicole shared the results of this method at the first inaugural Leadership Summit. A whopping 23 community leadership programs expressed interest in using REM, which indicated a strong interest for this type of evaluation support. Two of these programs were randomly selected to receive a free REM evaluation, which were completed in late summer and garnered notable media attention.

In the Fall of 2023, Nicole partnered with Scott Chazdon, the lead author of the Field Guide to Ripple Effects Mapping, to offer a three-part (6 hour) virtual “train-the-facilitator” on REM in an attempt to increase the number of Kentucky professionals who can facilitate this process. An average of 27 participants attended each session, 40% of which had Extension appointments (a mixture of Agents and Specialists).  The majority indicated they were interested in volunteering to help support a REM process and several have already done so (including writing successful grants to conduct REM, doing the mind mapping, practicing with report writing or taking notes, etc.). 

Nationally, Nicole is also increasingly known for her work in this area. She is the only junior scholar on a team of nationally renowned community development scholars who developed the REM process and are now facilitating a national community of practice (CoP) focused on REM.  The national CoP was launched by this team (Chazdon, S., Higgins, L., Sero, R., Hansen, D., Emery, M., Breazeale, N) in October 2022 and they have facilitated 5 sessions with an average of 25 participants. Additionally, Nicole has given 3 national conference presentations focused on REM and published an Extension publication on the topic (https://cedik.ca.uky.edu/sites/cedik.ca.uky.edu/files/ripple_effects_mapping_how-to_july_2022.pdf).   

This participatory evaluation method is a helpful addition to Kentucky Extension, where Agents struggle to assess the broader impact of their programming (Emery et al, 2015). Furthermore, given budget constraints, this technique can be used to “tell the story” of Extension (and other critical community-based programming) to public officials and other stakeholders (Franz, 2013).