How We Learn
At Democracy Fund, we believe our democracy is a complex, imperfect system — a work in progress. Our learning and impact practice helps ensure that our strategies and decisions are well-informed, accountable, and responsive to what we’re observing across our grantee partners and the democracy field at large.
We always seek to answer the question: How is Democracy Fund consistently contributing to positive change within our democracy — and what more can be done?
Why Learning Matters
By examining what’s happening in our democracy and how different pro-democracy organizations are interconnected, we can fully understand the impact of our contributions.
This knowledge allows us to make strategic changes to how we deploy our time, expertise, and financial resources so we can better advance our mission and vision.
Our Approach
Democracy Fund creates bold strategies to advance a democracy where everyone in the United States can thrive. To move our goals forward, we intentionally analyze if our strategies are contributing to the change we hope to see in our country.
We are continuously learning about the trends, tactics, and emerging ideas in the pro-democracy field. As we build relationships with grantees, we seek to learn about their experiences, the questions that animate their work, and the progress they’re tracking. We’re committed to sharing what we learn to build our collective understanding about the health of our democracy.
Our Learning Model
We IDENTIFY what’s still unknown and needs to be learned.
We ASK the questions that will get us closer to the answers we seek.
We PLAN how to learn what we don’t yet know and define what we’re measuring.
We OBSERVE + ANALYZE signals across our grantee partners and the democracy field that tell us what’s changing.
We REFLECT on the implications and impacts of what we’re observing and what it means.
We SHARE what we’ve learned with field leaders.
Collaborate With Us
With the goal of fostering a collaborative learning environment, we coordinate with grantee partners, peer funders, academics, and think tanks to identify challenges and needs in our democracy and to measure the impact of programs that seek to meet those needs.
If you’re interested in discussing what we’re learning or in sharing your findings, we’d love to hear from you.