About Uncommon Evaluation
Meet your evaluation sherpa.
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Hi, I’m Crystal!
I’ve spent the better part of two decades helping public and nonprofit organizations in the social and justice sectors navigate research, evaluation, and program development. Along the way, I noticed a pattern: brilliant, mission-driven teams doing incredible work, all while quietly dreading the word “evaluation.”
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I started Uncommon Evaluation to give those teams the support they deserve — especially the ones who’ve had evaluation quietly added to their job description without training, time, or backup. Over the years, I’ve seen evaluation land in the laps of executive directors wearing seventeen hats, program managers racing against the clock, and frontline staff doing their best to guess what a “theory of change” even is.
Let’s be real: evaluation can feel confusing, overwhelming, and unnecessarily complicated. Most people in these roles didn’t sign up to be evaluators—and yet, somehow, they end up having to do it anyway. That’s where Uncommon Evaluation comes in.
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This business was built for those who are bootstrapping their way through evaluation out of sheer necessity. We offer practical tools, plain-language resources, and supportive guidance to help you get the job done—without needing to take a stats course or lose sleep over outcome indicators. As I often say, my aim is to make evaluation so simple that a ham sandwich could do it.
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The UE approach is grounded, respectful of your time, and entirely fluff-free. No jargon. No academic gatekeeping. Just real help for people doing real work.
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Whether you need to report to a funder, demonstrate your impact, or just figure out if your program is actually doing what you hope it is, we’re here to help you evaluate with confidence—and maybe even enjoy the process a little. Stranger things have happened.​
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