Each of our groups has their own theory of change. Whilst they look different, what they all have in common is a pathway of change from the beginning or initial stages of the project to a 20 year vision. 

​Overall CEC theory of change
Vision: To disrupt disadvantage, leading to a more just and equitable society

The focus of the  CEC theory of change is on how our activities and behaviours impact systems-level outcomes by using a series of statements that outline behaviours (“if we”), activities (“by”) and outcomes (“then”). Statements are arranged around six areas of focus that the committee believes make the greatest contribution to the provision of relevant, positive and quality education in communities.

Te Hā o Mātauranga, Learning in Kaikōura
Vision: Our community having the skills and choices to live the life they want

This theory of change presents the short, medium and long term outcomes as a series of interconnected stepping stones, which are supported by ways of working (‘we will do this by’, ‘this will lead to’) and “how” statements. All this is guided by the vision.

*The two basic questions we use are:
1. Let's imagine that in 20 years time you are sitting on a chair on your front porch looking out over your community, feeling very happy and proud about what you are looking at. What does that look like? What are your the people doing? How are they feeling?
​2. What needed to change between now and then to make that happen?

The CEC project is led by a governing committee, who oversee funding and strategic decisions. Recently, the committee has moved from managing risk, to engaging risk. They are not afraid of engaging with ideas and projects that are new, untested and unproven. But their decisions are not made in an information vacuum.

The more time we spend working with CEC, the more we learn, which leads to new ideas about what might work to make change. This evidence is shared with the committee and our groups, to help support and plan for long term activity to support educational success.

In the interests of supporting other communities groups to disrupt disadvantage by strengthening the connections between communities and education, we have compiled some evidence around different ways of working, what is involved, the pros and cons, and likelihood of achieving CEC goals with these activities:

• ​Creating a School Curriculum
• ​One-off activities
• ​Community mobilisation
• ​Community participation in schools
• Whānau Ora
• Fostering social connections for Pasifika
• ​Community revitalisation/community building/community development
• ​Information and communication technology hubs
• ​Computers and devices in homes
  

A basic table of the evidence we have collected so far is presented below, or you can download a copy of our evidence document (with sources and additional resources) here.

There is this inspirational quote that says “be like a duck. Calm on the surface but paddling like the dickens underneath”. I don’t know who first said this – but clearly they didn’t spend much time paddling. It’s tiring. And boring. And it doesn’t matter how calm you look if you’re just paddling in circles.

Projects that focus too tightly on their activities are duck projects. There is a lot of busy paddling happening, but the outcomes and the vision often get forgotten about in the busyness of doing. Very little learning or reflection happens; these too are lost in the busyness of having to keep yourself above water. 


It’s very easy to fall into duck mode when you’re trying to create innovative social change. A far more effective model is the one used by the surfing Gentoo penguins. These surfing birds keep their eye on the horizon so they can see the swell and anticipate the wave set. They look to the shore to know how far they can ride the wave before hitting the sand or the reef below. And then when a wave comes that looks promising, then and only then, do they paddle like heck.

These penguins use what we like to call a tight-loose-tight approach.
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A ‘tight loose tight’ project is one where there is a tight focus on the project vision, a loose focus on the way the goals might be achieved (the activities), and a tight focus on outcomes. This approach is visualised below:

CEC is sometimes a bit tricky to describe. It has a name (Connecting Education and Communities), so that’s helpful. It has several agreed aims, principles and values. That's helpful too. But if we are ever actually asked the question “so what does CEC actually look like,” we hesitate.

Because it looks so different in each community. And as each community is developing and changing their project all the time, it makes it hard to pin down a description of what’s happening that lasts for longer than a couple of months.

As a project team, we’ve learned to be comfortable with this diverse and ever-changing reality. But we also have a committee that we report to, who need good information to help make decisions. We have a theory of change and an evaluation framework, which needs good information to help us understand what difference we are making. We have other stakeholders, including our groups, who like to know what’s going on.

​The thing is - we don't want to overburden our groups with reporting. We fund them to create connections, to innovate, to collaborate, to reflect, to make a difference and understand what differences they are making, and for whom. We'd really rather they didn't spend their time writing reports for us on how they are doing this. However we also need to make sure that our groups are on track and that things are going OK for them.

​So we started looking for a solution. We needed to find a way for our groups to 'report', without reporting. We wanted it to be visual, to allow creativity and allow multiple people to view, and use. We needed different levels of access permission so that our groups could confidently share what's working, as well as what isn't. It also needed to be super easy to use. Most importantly it needed to be free.

After some time spent looking, and testing, we settled on Trello.