Community Based Violence Intervention and Prevention Initiative Performance Measures Training

[Kerwin] Hello everyone and welcome to the BJA Community Based Violence Intervention and Prevention Initiative, or CVIPI, Performance Measures Training session. My name is Kerwin Henderson and I'm the BJA TTA specialist on BJA's Planning Performance and Impact team. We're happy you have joined us and are excited to present this session to you today. In addition to BJA grantees, we also welcome all OVC CVIPI grantees to today's session. While this training is branded for BJA grantees, today's information applies to OVC CVIPI grantees as well. Today's session is being recorded and will be posted on BJA's YouTube channel and multimedia page in the coming weeks. A PDF copy of today's slides will also be distributed to you later today. If you run into any tech issues throughout the session today, please reach out to Langston Payne, our Webex system facilitator. I encourage you to send him a private message via the chat function but his email address is also listed here. We also encourage you to ask all CVIPI and performance measure related questions. However, please note that for today's session we will only be taking questions directly from the Q&A panel. If you have an OVC award and would like to ask a question, please also include your email address with your question. Our team may not be able to answer your OVC questions today, but we have OVC representatives online with us today that will route your question to the appropriate source. To submit a question, please use the Q&A panel by clicking on the tab labeled "Q&A" located in the far right side of the bottom Webex window and choose "All Panelists" as a recipient. If we are unable to answer your questions during the allotted time today or if you need additional help after today's training we can provide you with one-on-one assistance. We'll provide contact information for our team at the end of the presentation. Panelists will use the chat box to share links and resources with you throughout the session today, so please make sure to check here throughout the session and only submit your questions in the Q&A panel. To give you a brief agenda for today, we will spend the first few minutes going over the roles of the BJA programming and introduce you to our BJA PPI team. I will then briefly explain the performance measurement process and its importance to grantees and to BJA. I will then briefly cover the CVIPI reporting schedule before transitioning to our CVIPI analyst, Angie Balchi who will cover CVIPI background and performance measures including the interim reporting requirements. We will wrap up today's presentation with a Q&A session. Members of the PPI team are on the line with us today to help answer any questions you may have about CVIPI and reporting. Without further ado, I want to introduce you to our Planning, Performance, and Impact team. The Bureau of Justice Assistance PPI team provides contractor support in the form of wraparound training and technical assistance on data collection and analysis support to grantees and for those staff from program inception to closeout. First, our management team is responsible for team leadership and client coordination and consists of a BJA program specialist, task lead, and deputy task lead. Our data analysis and performance measure review team is responsible for developing and revising performance measures, analyzing data, and responding to data requests. Next, our PMT Helpdesk responds to grantee questions on a variety of topics including performance measures, and finally the training and technical assistance team develops and conducts training for grantees and federal staff, like this training, and develops other reporting resources. I also want to specifically bring your attention to our technical assistance and helpdesk teams, as we are responsible for responding to your individual inquiries and training needs. For instance, if you have questions about navigating the PMT or a specific performance measure, our TTA team and PMT Helpdesk are available to answer your questions and walk you through any issues or concerns. Our contact information will be available at the end of this presentation, if you have questions about the assistance we can provide. We are happy to assist you. Please note that OVC grantees can reach out to us as well and we'll make sure your questions are routed to the appropriate team. The work you do as grantees is vitally important, so over the next few slides I'll explain performance measurement and briefly describe its importance to the work you do as grantees to BJA and beyond. Performance measurement is a process by which grantees regularly collect data on their grant activities to determine whether they're implementing activities as intended and achieving desired goals and objectives. That process helps to tell the story of you, the grantees, and your programs through data and assessment. Performance measures are used to capture inputs, outputs, and outcomes over time. Performance measures also allow for pre- and post-program implementation analysis that can be used to assess change as your program evolves. For more information about performance measurement at BJA, please visit the OJP Grant Performance Measurement and Progress Information portal. To find CVIPI performance measures, please visit the BJA Performance Measures website listed on the page. These measures are also included in your program solicitation and may be updated throughout the life of your program. We will review the performance measures more in depth later in this presentation. Understanding the importance of performance measurement ensures strong program development. Performance measures provide opportunities to improve existing programs and create ideas for new ones by showing raw outputs of program data. Performance measurement also allows you, as grantees, and BJA to answer the who, what, where, and when of your programs. For BJA, performance measures provide a holistic view of your programs to identify areas of success and potential opportunities for improvement. In addition, this information allows BJA to identify and create targeted training and technical assistance to help you, as the grantee, as you continue through the performance management process. Not only that, but collecting performance measures also helps the Department of Justice comply with the reporting requirements of federal law. This includes the Government Performance and Results Modernization Act of 2010, the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act of 2014, the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policy Making Act of 2018, and the Grant Reporting Efficiency and Agreements Transparency Act of 2019. Performance measurement provides a tremendous benefit to you as a grantee. It can help you proactively address challenges and generate evidence that you're meeting your goals and allows you to show the impacts of your program and organization. I'll briefly go over CVIPI reporting before transitioning to Angie Balchi, who will cover the CVIPI reporting process in detail. BJA's PMT and the Justice Grant system are two separate systems that both facilitate performance reporting for BJA. JustGrants will eventually replace the PMT entirely. However, we are still within that window of transition. CVIPI grantees will ultimately report in the PMT beginning in the July 2023 timeframe. Until reporting is ready in the PMT, grantees will track activity using an Excel spreadsheet reporting template, which you should have received via email already. If you did not receive the template, please reach out to the BJA PMT Helpdesk. OVC grantees will receive separate outreach about this template. Grantees are required to populate the Excel template with any grant activity from October 1 to December 30, 2022, and then attach the completed form to your performance report in JustGrants before the January 30, 2023 reporting deadline. Moving forward, grantees will continue to use this Excel template to track all grant activity. When reporting is ready in the PMT, we'll reach out to you. You will then be required to report grant data retroactively, as reporting frequency in the PMT is quarterly. This is what the reporting schedule looks like, until reporting is available in the PMT. You will continue to collect data using the Excel reporting template, because you will be asked to report that data in the PMT in the future. We suggest collecting it quarterly, as that is the timeframe you'll report on. This is what the reporting schedule will look like once reporting is available in the PMT. The process will change a bit. You will report on grant activity on a quarterly basis in the PMT. In January and July, you will have an additional step of attaching a PMT report of your grant activity to JustGrants. Then once your grant is nearing completion you have 120 days after the award end date to report on final grant activity in the PMT and then upload your final PMT report to JustGrants. I will now turn the presentation over to Angie Balchi who will cover the CVIPI reporting schedule, questionnaire, and Excel template in more detail. Angie? - [Angie] Thank you, Kerwin, and thank you everyone for being here today. We will discuss what you will need to be reporting as a CVIPI grantee, so: what data will you need to report? There are three types of performance measure data contained within performance reporting. Performance measures are a series of questions that measure the outcomes of your grant activities and help demonstrate the accomplishments of your goals and objectives of your grant program. Performance measures can be in the form of narrative responses, check-all-that-apply responses, or numeric responses. These performance measures are due quarterly. Narrative questions are a series of fill-in-the-blank questions related to your specific goals, objectives, barriers, and successes that also can be used to provide support for progress. Narrative questions are reported semiannually, in January and July reporting period. Finally, closeout questions are a series of questions that you have to complete only when your grant is ended and activities are completed. Next slide, please. As Kerwin mentioned, the CVIPI questionnaire will not be available in the PMT for the January reporting period. As he also mentioned, you should have already received in your email the interim reporting mechanism through the Excel template. This will be used until the PMT is available, most likely in the July 2023 reporting period. So, until then, please use and track your data using the Excel template which we'll go over in more depth. So again, on the next slide, you'll see the link to your CVIPI performance measure questionnaire as a pdf. This was included in your original solicitation, so it should look familiar, but do refer to that PDF questionnaire, and you can also track your data in there for when it is time to report your totals in the Excel template or in the PMT when it's available. If you have any questions regarding this PDF or the template, again, please contact our PMT Helpdesk. The CVIPI questionnaire is divided into several sections that are related to the CVIPI program goals and objectives. You'll see these sections listed here and we'll go more in depth slide-by-slide, so you can understand some of the questions and requirements that are contained within each of these sections. You'll see on this slide, and from here on out, screenshots of the Excel reporting template that you'll be using until reporting is available in the PMT, and so it should look relatively similar to the PDF questionnaire, but just in a different format, in a fillable Excel form. And so, the first page here is just collecting your basic grantee information. It will have the reporting period that you are reporting for, and your award information, so please insert your grantee legal name, state, your federal award number, and federal award amount. If you are a subrecipient, you will click an X in the right-hand side and also include your award number and award amount. This information will be crucial so that we can track your information and you can update it in the PMT later. The instructions then help guide you through the questionnaire and provide links for you to track your reporting. On the next slide, you'll see the first section of performance measures that are required to report. These are whether you had grant activity during the reporting period. Once your grant is active, you have grant activity and you are required to report until the award is completed. If you did not have grant activity, you will select the reason for no grant activity during the reporting period and you will not be completing the rest of the performance questionnaire during that reporting period. If you do have grant activity, you'll be guided to continue on to the rest of the questionnaire. The questionnaire begins with your violence reduction strategic planning section. You will respond if you have started or are in progress of your strategic planning and add additional information in question four. You will see the yellow boxes, the light yellow boxes are where your selection or response is to be entered, and you'll see the dark yellow instructions will help guide you for where to go next and what type of answer is expected in that box. So, sometimes, as you can see, question three is "select one of the options," so you'll just put an X in one of those boxes and when you're in the live Excel template, when you hover, it will show you whether it would like you to put a number- a numeric response-or an X, or a text response. Similarly, in question four, you will enter your narrative response in the yellow box provided. In the next section, you will begin to answer about your targeted violence interventions and supports that you are providing for your grant program. As you can see, this is a "select all that apply" option, so you will put Xs in any of the strategies that you are implementing in your program. If you have selected "Other," we ask that you please explain and describe your response for the intervention that was not listed. On the next slide, you will see examples of some questions that are numeric based. The yellow boxes will only allow you to put in a number form. So, please be sure to pay attention to the box instructions as you are filling out the information. The next slide section of the questionnaire will get more into your CVIPI procedures and trainings. Again, there is a mix here of check-all-that-apply, check-one, and numeric responses. So again, please be sure to follow instructions as you are going through the questionnaire. In the next section, we'll ask about your community collaboration and engagement as part of your program. You will be asked to describe any specific activities that you have taken during the reporting period, and any of the following activities, to select options that are either "Not applicable," "Do not know," "Daily," "Weekly," or "Monthly." And again, those options will appear as a dropdown in that question. The next section will, again, ask for more information regarding the types of strategies that you are employing in your CVI program. Again, this is a select-all-that-apply type of question, so you'll simply put Xs in any of the strategies that you are using during this reporting period. Again, please be sure if you select "Other" that you enter a description in the box indicated. The final section is targeted interventions and supports that you are providing for your CVIPI program. Again, please select all that apply and enter any additional information for other strategies used. You will see in the Excel template at the bottom of each section, links for the following sections that you have yet to complete. So, if you get lost at any point, you can click a link and it'll take you to the correct section, or you can just follow along through the tabs at the bottom of the Excel template. Again, as you're completing these templates, if you have any questions or you're unsure if you should be answering a question, please reach out to the PMT Helpdesk and we will provide further guidance. As we mentioned, narrative questions are due semiannually, in the January and July reporting period. So, you will be reporting performance measures and narrative responses in your upcoming reporting period. Narrative question responses should be based on the SMART mnemonic. This is a good way to think through and develop good goals and objectives. The SMART mnemonic means that goals should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-based. We recommend that you reevaluate your goals as you're responding to your narrative questions semiannually to determine if they should be updated. Also, using your narrative responses are a good way to track your data and your goals and assess your progress. On the next slide, you'll see some examples of good goals using the SMART mnemonic. So you can see some examples here on the left-hand side. Those are really good goals that are specific and measurable, and the goals on the right hand side are great goals, but could be improved and are not specific enough to measure success. Finally, we would like to go over some data quality best practices, as you are preparing for reporting. Please be sure to designate a staff for coordination and reporting of performance data. This person should review the performance measure questionnaire before entering data, and, again, reach out to us with any questions before entering data. Again, ensure that this designated staff participate in these trainings or future trainings and designate a backup person, if needed. Be sure to review, edit, and validate your data with any subrecipients or your own data before submission and be mindful of the validation alerts that are built into the reporting systems, or, as I mentioned, that are built into the Excel template that will help guide you to what type of response is needed or if you do not have to answer a question. Kerwin? - [Kerwin] Thanks, Angie. Listed on the screen is the contact information for the PMT Helpdesk and the PPI team. Please feel free to contact the PMT Helpdesk if you have any questions about your BJA or OVC CVIPI performance measures, or if you would like to receive technical assistance on completing the CVIPI Excel reporting template. Our team is happy to assist you. Please note, however that the PPI team is not able to help with any questions about the JustGrants system. We'll go ahead and wrap up today's session, but thank you all for your questions. If you have any follow-up questions, please contact us through the BJA PMT Helpdesk, or directly reach out to me, your TTA specialist, or your BJA grant managers. For OVC, feel free to reach out to the OVC Helpdesk. We'll respond to any questions not answered in today's session by email over the next few days. As mentioned previously, you will receive a PDF copy of today's presentation later on today. Thank you so much for joining us and we hope that you have a great rest of the day today. Happy reporting.