Date: Saturday, November 15, 2025
Hello! We’re Angel Villalobos and Elizabeth Waetzig, and we co-direct Expanding the Bench® (ETB), a community rooted in Culturally Responsive and Equitable Evaluation (CREE) and grounded in the understanding that change happens through connection, reflection, and care. We see the evaluation field as an ecosystem: dynamic, interdependent, and strengthened by the people and communities within it.
This moment, when the values of equity and justice are being challenged and, in many places, actively undermined, has pushed us to reflect on what it means to stay grounded, sustain purpose, and move with courage and clarity. We’re finding our way forward through connection with the ETB Community, drawing strength and direction from the collective reflection, care, and creativity that continue to sustain this work.
For us, transformation has become less about designing change and more about living it. It shows up in how we treat each other, how we make decisions, and how we hold our purpose when things feel uncertain.
As part of our reflection and place-based work, we’ve been grounding ourselves in the idea of an ecosystem, one that is interconnected and requires movement at all levels for lasting systems change to take root. This framing has helped us remember that transformation doesn’t belong to one person or one organization. It depends on all of us.
In our current visualization of the ETB Theory of Change, our work is like a tree. Our programs are at the roots, such as LEEAD, ACE, ETB: Regional, and Field Building. We collectively tend to the roots alongside Evaluators, Funders of Evaluation, and communities across the field who keep the work of CREE alive and growing. Together, we nourish the roots and conditions needed for change.
The trunk of the tree represents what connects and grounds us: the flow of relationships, reflection, and learning that strengthens our collective practice. And as these relationships deepen, new branches emerge from the tree, expressed through shifts in power, trust, and accountability that are carried forward through how people engage and lead in their own spaces.
This reflection has reminded us that tending to this evaluation ecosystem is shared work. Each of us holds a part of what makes it thrive. Transformation, at its core, is sustained through the ongoing care we give to one another and to the values that connect us.
As we’ve reflected on our Theory of Change through this ecosystem lens, we’ve learned that clarity doesn’t come from having all the answers. It comes from pausing long enough to notice what’s already growing and starting there. The work ahead requires intention and interdependence, and none of us can do it alone.
When things feel uncertain, we ask ourselves:
As we share this reflection to begin AEA week, we’re grateful for the spaces, virtual and in person, that allow us to keep learning, connecting, and tending to this work together.
The American Evaluation Association is hosting Expanding The Bench® week. Expanding the Bench® is an initiative committed to diversifying evaluation and elevating culturally responsive and equitable evaluation. The contributions all this week to AEA365 come from partners of Expanding The Bench®. Do you have questions, concerns, kudos, or content to extend this AEA365 contribution? Please add them in the comments section for this post on the AEA365 webpage so that we may enrich our community of practice. Would you like to submit an AEA365 Tip? Please send a note of interest to AEA365@eval.org. AEA365 is sponsored by the American Evaluation Association and provides a Tip-a-Day by and for evaluators. The views and opinions expressed on the AEA365 blog are solely those of the original authors and other contributors. These views and opinions do not necessarily represent those of the American Evaluation Association, and/or any/all contributors to this site.