PTW Community Presents: Beyond the Numbers - Making Data a Tool for Collective Creativity and Social Change

In today's data-intensive world, organizations are often drowning in data and starved for wisdom.

That's why Veronica Smith founded data2insight: to help people make meaning from data in ways that align with their values, illuminate both their challenges and strengths, and help secure the resources needed to build community and improve lives.            

In this interactive workshop, Veronica will introduce a playful, collaborative approach to evaluation that helps organizations engage staff, interest holders, donors, and community members to generate insights together. Participants will experience how making meaning of data can become a collective, creative practice that strengthens programs, deepens learning, and tells a more compelling story to funders, donors, and community partners.

For performance activists and other leaders creating change in their communities, learning how to tell the story of your work—both to yourselves and to others—is an essential part of growing your impact. Whether you're part of a nonprofit, grassroots movement, arts organization, or community initiative, you'll leave with practical tools and a new way of thinking about evaluation—not as a reporting requirement, but as an opportunity to learn, grow, and build support for the work you care about.

Leader Biography

Veronica S. Smith weaves design, engineering, evaluation, and play into a career of interdisciplinary co-creation. She practiced architecture and was a neuroscientist, worked in the tech sector, then founded data2insight, evaluating PreK-grad education and workforce development programs. She also has partnered with scores of community-based and mission-driven organizations to provide action-oriented research and evaluation that supports continuous learning, improvement, and growth. Veronica’s professional, education, and life experiences have underscored her passion for compassionate inquiry and joyful collaboration that helps communities collect and protect their data, tell stories, liberate themselves, and create the future they want.