What’s New at BTW informing change — Fall 2006

Welcome Ruth Brousseau!
We couldn't be happier to announce that Ruth Brousseau has joined the BTW informing change team as a Senior Strategist. Ruth comes to us with 25 years of experience working in the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors. Most recently, Ruth served as Director of Evaluation and Organizational Learning at The California Wellness Foundation where she helped create systems to enable the Foundation to learn from its work, communicate findings internally and share lessons with key stakeholders. Prior to her work at The California Wellness Foundation, Ruth was the program officer for community health at The San Francisco Foundation. With a Ph.D. in psychology and social relations from Harvard University, Ruth's academic training focused on social science research with an emphasis on mental health epidemiology. She did her post-doctoral training at the University of California, Berkeley in mental health, culture and society. Ruth publishes and speaks nationally on a wide range of topics from creative grantmaking to building the capacity of nonprofit organizations.
 
Ruth has a passion for the process of using data to inform decision making and practice across many content areas. Working with BTW on a part-time basis as she continues to pursue other personal and professional interests, Ruth is leading BTW’s team on an evaluation for the Bay Area Workforce Funding Collaborative and serving as senior advisor to BTW’s Community Clinics Initiative evaluation team.

BTW in the News
As many of you know, Fay Twersky, founding partner of BTW informing change, left BTW in August to assume the position of Impact Assessment and Improvement Officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Fay’s contributions and departure caught the attention of a local newspaper in Berkeley, leading to a profile of Fay and the company.

New Projects, New Partners
BTW approaches our work with clients as true partnerships in which both parties are equally committed to a quality process and productive engagement. We believe that a quality engagement demands commitment from both parties. We are particularly pleased to announce our two newest clients:

BTW Welcomes New Staff
We are pleased to welcome two new staff to our BTW informing change team - Inbar Hurvitz and Katie Winters.

Inbar Hurvitz joins us as an Associate with several years of experience providing nonprofits and schools with data and analysis to inform decision-making and advance social change. She brings experience conducting large evaluation projects including studies of school-linked services such as mentoring after-school programs and family support programs. Prior to joining BTW, Inbar was an evaluation consultant with Hatchuel Tabernik and Associates. She has also worked as an independent consultant and was the Program Director for the Israel Center of the Jewish Community Federation. Inbar earned a Master of Public Policy degree from the University of California, Berkeley. She is a graduate of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and holds a B.A. degree in Political Science and East Asian Studies.

Katie Winters is our newest Project Assistant, providing research and administrative support on multiple projects. Prior to joining the BTW team, Katie served as associate producer for InCA Productions, producing documentary and educational television programs ranging from arts and performance works to in-depth science shows. Katie earned her B.A. degree in Anthropology and Film from the University of California, Berkeley and graduated with honors. While at the University Katie was selected for the Undergraduate Research Apprentice Program and worked closely with faculty on cutting edge research projects.

BTW Continues to Search for a Senior Candidate
The right candidate will have passion for both product and process, more than ten years experience working with or in nonprofits and philanthropic organizations, a commitment to using information to make decisions and improve practice, good technical skills in data collection and analysis as well as strong process facilitation/management skills to lead groups through the challenge of change. The perfect candidate will share our values of intelligence, integrity and compassion and will be an enthusiastic contributor to BTW’s continued growth and development. Does this sound like you or someone you know? If so, please contact Jill Blair, Principal, at jblair@btw.informingchange.com or call 206-328-5196.

Social Capital in Funder-Grantee Collaboratives
A funders collaborative in Houston, led by the Rockwell Fund, Inc., hired BTW last year to assist them with planning and evaluating a new initiative to build the capacity of Zip Code Assistance Ministries (ZCAMs) in the region. ZCAMs are faith-based nonprofits providing emergency social and human services. This Initiative, called the ZCAM Organizational Development Program, was modeled on OCGI, a project that BTW evaluated for three Bay Area funders several years ago. Part of BTW’s work with the Houston initiative is to develop and facilitate an annual reflection and learning session for funders, ZCAM executives and key program partners. In preparation for the reflection session this year, BTW prepared a paper on social capital formation and its relevance to building organizational capacity and creating a culture of collaboration and shared learning among ZCAM leaders.

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