Now or Never: An Urgent Call to Action for Nova Scotians, the title of a report released in 2014 by the One Nova Scotia Commission called attention for the need for “Facing Forward” in the province. “Facing Forward” in this report called for a new way of doing business in the province to ensure a sustainable future. After reading “Now or Never” I decided to move back to my home province to start using my evaluation skills to try to help wherever I am needed (see my #EvaluatorOriginStory blog post http://www.craigmoorenovascotia.com/news/nova-scotia-evaluator-origin-story/). For me this report represented a personal call to action.

This year’s conference will be an opportunity for me to travel to the other side of the country to both learn about, and reflect on, evaluation. This year’s conference theme “Facing Forward” will be front of mind as it I reflect on the Now or Never report, and how evaluation can be innovated, used (action), and reflected upon, to help me with my work in the province. Not only will I be taking in the conference—I will also be sharing my work, networking, and collaborating with other evaluators from across the country, who are “Facing Forward” in their own contexts. One example of this active sharing is a thematic breakfast with my colleague Brian Hoessler (link: https://twitter.com/bhoessler) from Saskatoon. We will be sharing our experiences conducting evaluation work outside of major urban centres and learning from other evaluators in similar contexts who also be attending the conference.

While it is a quite a long journey to cross the country for a few days of professional development, for me the benefits far outweigh the costs. As an emerging evaluator who wants to contribute to the field, I can relate to comments made in a blog post by another colleague (Link: http://c2017.evaluationcanada.ca/blog/future-of-evaluation-emerging-evaluators-on-the-horizon-by-carolyn-canman/ ), Carolyn Camman (https://twitter.com/c_camman). Evaluation is always evolving and the active nature of a CES Conference allows us all to learn how best to “Face Forward”- how to innovate, create action, and how to reflect on our own practices, and those of the organizations we work with. The cross-Canada journey for me is especially relevant this year as I had the opportunity to cross the country last year when I collaborated in a three-site evaluation.  This year I will be crossing the country to present that collaboration at the conference!

I look forward to the journeys both to the conference, and during the conference, as we all actively learn from each other, and “Face Forward” together.

Bio: Craig Moore is a Change Leader, Evaluator, and proud Nova Scotian, based in Halifax.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/MoreCaptain

Website: http://www.craigmoorenovascotia.com/