Ethics. Operations. Community Responsibility.
How we hold the work.
Our work is guided by core values and ethical standards that shape how we operate, how we partner, and how we move knowledge beyond institutions and into communities to create impact.
Our Orientation
Community impact requires ethical practice.
Our ethical and operational standards guide how we enter communities, design projects, gather and interpret information, share findings, and support partners in moving from insight to action.
Inspired by the clarity of values-based pages, this page organizes our commitments as both principles and practical standards for how we do the work.
Beyond the Ivory Tower
Knowledge should move.
Communities should benefit.
Create. Discover. Disseminate. Impact.
As scholars, researchers, evaluators, educators, implementors, practitioners, and community members, we recognize the value of engaged scholarship and believe knowledge should not remain locked inside academic journals, conference rooms, university offices, or technical reports that only a few people can access or understand.
Our Belief and Responsibility
Scholarship becomes ethical
when it becomes useful.
Why this matters
We understand that the Ivory Tower has often created distance between institutions and communities. Re/val exists, in part, to challenge that distance through scholarly practice rooted in humility, accountability, community usefulness, and the belief that local knowledge is expertise.
How we respond
We are committed to work rooted in humility, accountability, and community usefulness. We do not enter communities assuming we have all the answers. We enter with questions, with tools, with respect, and with a commitment to helping partners make sense of what they already know while uncovering what else needs to be understood. For us, thinking and engaging outside the Ivory Tower means refusing to separate scholarship from service, research from responsibility, or knowledge from action.
Ethical and Operational Standards
Five commitments guide how we engage.
Place-Based Strategies
We honor the importance of local context—social, historical, cultural, and geographical—in shaping sustainable, relevant strategies for change. We tailor our approaches to reflect and respond to the unique needs and strengths of each place.
- Conduct locally responsive research and engagement that respects traditions, values, customs, histories, and lived realities.
- Value local leadership, labor, and wisdom in all aspects of decision-making.
- Avoid one-size-fits-all models or strategies.
Interdependence
We center the role of shared humanity, mutual respect, and collective impact. Every individual plays a role in their community, and every community connects to and impacts other communities, influencing how society evolves, grows, and survives.
- Uphold dignity, compassion, and care in all relationships.
- Value interconnectedness to create opportunities for solidarity across differences.
- Challenge systems and behaviors that dehumanize, devalue, or divide.
Lived Realities
We value the voices, expertise, and leadership of those with relevant lived experiences. Their insights are not only valid but vital in driving meaningful and sustainable outcomes.
- Acknowledge individuals with lived experience for their contributions.
- Avoid extractive practices.
- Create spaces and opportunities for people to share, lead, engage, and influence.
Community Engagement & Collaboration
We are committed to power-sharing and authentic collaboration with communities. We believe sustainable transformation happens when people and communities are meaningfully involved in driving and shaping their own futures.
- Utilize collaborative methods in goal setting, programming, evaluations, and other joint efforts.
- Foster participatory decision-making and co-creation with community stakeholders.
- Recognize and address power imbalances in all partnerships and engagements.
Strengths-Based Perspectives
We believe every individual and community possesses inherent strengths, capacities, and assets. Our approach seeks to recognize, elevate, and build upon these strengths rather than focusing solely on deficits.
- Affirm the resilience, knowledge, and skills of those we serve and partner with.
- Design programs and strategies that harness and develop community and individual assets.
- Acknowledge shortcomings while recognizing that challenges and obstacles are opportunities for improvement, not permanent limitations.
Interested in working with us?
We partner with organizations, agencies, foundations, schools, nonprofits, and community leaders who need research, evaluation, engagement, and strategy grounded in ethical, people-centered practice.