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How can you use the EPI approach?

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Everyday indicators, gathered from community experiences, provide valuable insights that can shape policies, programs and community initiatives. Local and national governments can use this data to plan projects that directly address what matters most to people. Community organizations can create more effective programs tailored to local needs. Schools can use this information to design activities that connect with students’ real lives and electoral candidates can build platforms that reflect the key concerns of their communities.

Design with the EPI approach

The EPI approach integrates lived experiences and community voices directly into program design, ensuring that initiatives reflect local priorities. Everyday indicators guide organizations to identify key challenges and adjust their strategies to better align with community needs. These insights are crucial for shaping programs that span areas such as employment, infrastructure, education and conflict resolution.

By using everyday indicators to inform and evaluate peacebuilding initiatives, programs have a greater chance of success and sustainability.

By using everyday indicators to inform and evaluate peacebuilding initiatives, projects have a greater chance of success and sustainability.

Project Examples

SCORE Program Design in Sri Lanka

Everyday reconciliation indicators were central to shaping USAID’s Social Cohesion and Reconciliation (SCORE) program across 20 Grama Niladhari Divisions. Under this program, a variety of initiatives were developed based on community-sourced indicators of reconciliation. These projects addressed a range of local priorities, from constructing water purification centers to providing mobile huts for female entrepreneurs, offering language training for government officials, delivering anti-hate speech media workshops for youth, and forming community-based conflict prevention committees. Each initiative was directly informed by everyday indicators, ensuring that they tackled the critical issues identified by the community itself.

Evaluate with the EPI approach

The EPI approach helps ensure programs stay aligned with community needs. Everyday indicators—defined and tracked by community members—become the measures of success. This participatory method shows real impact from the perspective of those most affected, making outcomes more relevant, effective and sustainable.

Our participatory evaluations measure success through the lived experiences of communities, ensuring that the results reflect their realities and priorities.

Project Examples

SCORE Program Evaluation in Sri Lanka

To measure the impact of the SCORE program in Sri Lanka, we used community-generated indicators to conduct surveys in target communities both before and after the program’s implementation, comparing them with similar communities. These surveys revealed the program’s effectiveness in promoting reconciliation, as defined by the communities themselves. Our fieldwork provided deeper insights into how reconciliation evolved and the specific ways the program influenced inter-ethnic relations. While we identified some areas for improvement, the data showed meaningful progress in key reconciliation indicators, underscoring the importance of community-driven evaluation in fostering grassroots reconciliation.

IAF Project Evaluations in Colombia

In collaboration with the Inter-American Foundation (IAF), we applied our participatory evaluation methods to projects in Sucre and Cauca, Colombia, to better understand their contributions to peace and coexistence. We worked closely with the IAF team to tailor the evaluation process to the unique needs of these communities. As part of this partnership, we also trained IAF staff to integrate our methodology into their ongoing work.

Our evaluation of the two IAF-funded projects has been recognized as the most extensive in the IAF’s 54 year history.

Engage communities with the EPI approach

The EPI approach makes communities active partners in research and change. People define their own indicators of peace, highlighting local priorities, sharing experiences and taking collective action. Instead of storing data in reports, EPI shares findings in accessible formats like exhibitions, meetings, workshops and summaries.

Photovoice is one way EPI brings indicators back to communities. This participatory method empowers people to express their perspectives through photography and writing. Citizen photographers document daily life, creating images that reflect the meaning behind their indicators. These photostories are exhibited in public spaces to spark conversations about local needs and hopes for peace.

Photovoice challenges traditional photography by involving communities in curating and displaying images in everyday settings. This visibility fosters pride and ongoing dialogue.

The indicators also inspire community action. In Sri Lanka, a community identified a playground as a everyday sign of peace. Local groups responded by improving the space so children could play safely.

Our participatory evaluations measure success through the lived experiences of communities, ensuring that the results reflect their realities and priorities.

Project Examples

Returning Data to Communities in Colombia

In Colombia, we created an interactive card game to return community-generated data. We held over 15 dialogue workshops across 24 communities to collect indicators of justice, coexistence and peace. The card game features 40 key indicators prioritized by each community, grouped into categories. Each card includes a question based on the indicator, with answer options and relevant community details.

This engaging approach ensures communities not only receive their data but actively use it. The game transforms data into a tool for dialogue and decision-making, allowing communities to explore and act on the indicators they’ve created in a dynamic and meaningful way.

Photostories in Colombia, Mostar and Oakland

In several of our projects, we use a visual tool called Photovoice to bring everyday indicators to life. Photovoice allows community members to visually tell the stories behind the data through photography, helping to spark discussions both within the community and with external stakeholders. These images capture what peace looks like, helping to bridge the gap between local realities and broader audiences.

Artisan Well in San Jacinto, Montes de María in Colombia

In a rural community in San Jacinto, access to clean water was a daily challenge. Through everyday indicators like, “There is an aqueduct that everyone can access” “The community aqueduct is built” and “Drinking water is available for the entire community” it became clear that the most pressing need was a reliable water source. This data led to collective action, and with support from local leaders and organizations, an artisan well was built. The well was connected to a new aqueduct system, providing every household with clean, safe drinking water. This project not only transformed daily life for the community but also highlighted how locally-sourced knowledge can drive real change.

Innovate with the EPI approach

The EPI approach brings lived experience into policy design. Everyday indicators reveal barriers to peace or reconciliation and show where government action—or inaction—is holding back progress. This community-driven method highlights where changes in policy, funding or public services are needed.

By listening to and understanding lived experiences, we gain deeper insights into how peace manifests in daily life and can inform policy with community perspectives.

Project Examples

Everyday Indicators for Policy Innovation in California

This project explored how lived experiences can inform public safety policy in Oakland, California. We believe that those most impacted by policy reforms should be at the forefront of shaping them. Partnering with local organizations, we engaged Oakland residents through a modified version of the EPI approach, called the Firsthand Framework for Policy Innovation. Residents from nine communities answered questions like “What does safety—or the lack of it—look like here?” and “What signs show community thriving or struggle?” The findings emphasize the importance of a holistic approach to public safety, one that extends beyond traditional criminal justice measures. We are now working with the City of Oakland’s Department of Violence Prevention to co-create, implement and assess solutions based on the Firsthand Framework, ensuring that public safety reforms are in line with the community’s perspectives and priorities.