UNESCO’s emphasis on quality education and learning is essential; throughout its report on education, the organization distinguishes education as a human-centered process from education as a product to be consumed. That distinction defines praxis.
praxis is a collaboration between the Posner Center and Regis University’s Development Practice to bring practical, applicable, and critical education to social impact professionals, at home and abroad.
Video editing and computer training workshops at the SOS Children’s Village in Calbayog City, Philippines in 2011. Credit: Cedar Spring Wolf
These courses not only provide new content but also opportunities and support to apply that content directly to your organization.
praxis courses are designed to be accessed from anywhere in the world. Students with a variety of professional backgrounds in nonprofits, health, government, gender, education, WASH, and more engage with their instructors and each other via real-time, video-conferenced class meetings and discussions.
Enrollment in the praxis program not only gives you access to world-class instructors and courses to deepen your development practice but also connects you to the Posner Center Community.
The Programs
Data, Design, and Evaluation
Data, Design, and Evaluation is a series of monitoring and evaluation (M&E) skills courses, designed to strengthen the development practice of the Posner Center community and beyond. These courses are not theoretical but instead focus on using your work and your data to strengthen your evaluation practices in real time alongside a cohort of students from all around the world.
Certificate of Evidence-Based Development: Data, Design, and Evaluation
The Posner Center offers the praxis Certificate of Evidence-Based Development, a 5-course certificate designed to build your research and evaluation skills. Completion of 5 courses from the list below, attainable within six months or less, will earn you the certificate. To be considered as having completed a course, you must attend all classes, complete all assignments, and receive a grade of a B or higher.
Course Details & Dates
M&E I: Foundations and FrameworksM&E II: Design and Data ManagementQualitative Data CollectionQualitative Data AssessmentData VisualizationProgram Design
M&E I: Foundations and Frameworks
This course will provide students with a working knowledge of the field of M&E and lay the foundation for continued learning and implementation.
Students will learn:
Key concepts and associated terms of M&E
Frameworks for establishing causal logic
Approaches to defining and measuring project deliverables and impacts
Next Course Offered: Spring: May 7th, 9th and 14th from 7 to 9 am MST
M&E II: Design and Data Management
This course builds on lessons from Monitoring and Evaluation I, going more in-depth on effective theories of change and criteria for developing the appropriate indicators to measure them. Students will learn the technical aspects of quality indicators and the processes involved in their development.
Students will learn:
Indicator development
Data collection methodologies
Development of an M&E plan
M&E tools for data visualization, collection, and analysis
Next Course Offered: Summer:May 28th and 30th and June4th from 7 to 9 am MST
Qualitative Data Collection
This course is an introduction to the principles and techniques of qualitative data collection with a particular focus on the researcher as the instrument. Students will be able to customize class projects to their own context by completing either interviews or focus groups. Course content will touch on topics such as positioning yourself as a learner and active listener, asking effective questions, and reading verbal and non-verbal cues. Participants will develop the personal mindset and self-presentation needed to cultivate relevant and nuanced interactions. The goal of this course is to teach the art of qualitative data collection to produce data filled with generative insights.
Students will:
Navigate the relational space during the interview or focus group process including managing personal bias, active listening, and how to ask questions that promote open dialogue
Manage personal mental space during the interview or focus group process including techniques to decenter the self
Develop a reflexive practice through reflexive journaling
Participants will learn the art of iterative analysis that both addresses the research or evaluation goals and maintains the voice and perspective of participants. Class projects will include analysis of a sample data workbook, without requiring expensive software, and students will receive helpful feedback to inform future projects. Course content will touch on topics such as inductive and deductive analysis, memo writing, triangulating data, and formulating finding statements. The goal of this course is to teach the art of qualitative data assessment to produce useful and rigorous finding statements.
Students will:
Understand the iterative nature of qualitative data analysis
Identify and develop different types of codes
Convert raw qualitative data into useful insights
Write an analytic memo
Draft a findings statement related to the data coded
In an increasingly data-rich world, visualization is more important than ever for communicating trends in global development as well as showing impact, understanding your stakeholders, and adding visuals to grant proposals and sending to donors. Well-designed visualizations can provide important insight, but poor design can be confusing at best and misleading at worst. This course will cover the basics of data visualization, including interpretation and best practices for designing graphs, maps, and other visualization approaches. Students will learn to evaluate the effectiveness of visualization designs, and think critically about each design decision. Students will create their own data visualizations, and learn to use Open Source data visualization tools and data sources. Students will learn to better interpret and improve on visualizations they encounter, and to create clear and informative visualizations for use in development practice.
Students will learn:
Understand best practices for the design of data visualizations, including infographics, maps, charts, and graphs.
Critique and improve the clarity, precision, and information content of their own visualizations and those developed by others.
Use visualizations effectively to improve storytelling for diverse audiences in the development field.
Recognize the wide range of resources available for furthering their work on data visualization.
Produce a visualization that tells a data story, shows impact, and is intended for a particular audience.
Next Course Offered: Summer: July 23rd, July 26th, July 30th and August 2nd from 7 to 9 am MST
Program Design
*Cancelled for 2024*
Nonprofits and nongovernmental organizations live and thrive by the effectiveness in planning and execution of their mission-directed programs. Ideally, the better the design, implementation, and evaluation, the better the attainment of the mission. This course explores approaches for strategic program design, implementation, and evaluation. We consider research-based best practices and applied program evaluability through needs assessment, data collection, stakeholder participation, and empowerment. Finally, we review the need for a systems approach and the logic model as strategies for program effectiveness.
Students will learn:
Processes of needs assessment, data collection, and stakeholder participation and empowerment
Systems’ approach and the logic model as strategies for program effectiveness
Design a plan for program evaluation via class project
For questions or more information, contact Maggie Larson at
New Lenses for Storytelling: From Critique to (re)Creation
Video editing and computer training workshops at the SOS Children’s Village in Calbayog City, Philippines in 2011. Credit: Cedar Spring Wolf
Crafted, composed, honed, and edited, stories can showcase progress or box in a problem. As the call to decolonize aid and development continues to gain momentum, many organizations are applying a critical lens to how they do their work. We want to refocus that lens on how organizations tell their stories so they may truly live into their decolonizing values.
Rebel Spirit Collective is creating a web of storytellers with contributions to decolonized development media. In this multi-course series, participants move through cycles of critique and creation. As they flip critical lenses into mirrors, storytellers are able to discover new ways of creating and sharing both the process and product of storytelling. Individuals and teams contribute to decolonization by forming new ways of storytelling that challenge the status quo.
Certificate of Decolonized Storytelling
Women Entrepreneurs in Namibia in 2016. Credit: Cedar Spring Wolf
The Posner Center offers the praxis Certificate of Decolonized Storytelling to participants who complete the first two courses, “Storytelling Practices Through a Decolonized Lens” and “From Critique to (Re)Creation: Pitching & Executing a Decolonized Storytelling Strategy”. To be considered as having completed a course, you must attend all classes, complete all assignments, and receive a grade of a B or higher.
Decolonizing Storytelling Film Festival
To celebrate the stories shared by our participants, we will be organizing a film festival! More details coming soon.
Engineers Without Borders USA Film Festival in Boulder, Colorado, 2014
Course Details & Dates
Storytelling Practices Through a Decolonized LensFrom Critique to (Re)Creation: Pitching & Executing a Decolonized Storytelling Strategy Video Storytelling Technical Skills6-Month Creative Intensive
Storytelling Practices Through a Decolonized Lens
This course will critically examine current global communication trends, values & biases, then apply them to an individual’s organization.
Students will learn:
How to share stories through a decolonized lens
Current media trends and biases
Media inputs & outputs and creation processes
Critical analysis of aid & development media
Critical analysis of organization’s media through examination of bias, narrative, consent & creation practice
Summer: Tuesdays, September 19 and 26, and October 3, 10, 17, and 24 – 7 to 9am MST/5pm to 7pm EAT
Course fee: $300
Video Storytelling Technical Skills
To support new storytellers and new storytelling skills, Rebel Spirit Collectivewill be offering a variety of technical skills, short workshops. These online, real-time instruction workshops will cover a variety of material related to the technical skills for pre-production through production of content.
The first workshop will be held in late March and will be a 2-weekend creation intensive titled, “Storytelling From Your Palm.” This workshop will focus on creating new stories from the palm of your hand.
Check back for future workshops!
Next Course Offered:
Storytelling From Your Palm
This is a two-weekend workshop where you’ll learn and practice basic storytelling techniques using your smartphone. This is perfect for new storytellers or those looking to change the formats we often see in smartphone storytelling. Our course includes two meeting times, Saturday for 4 hours and the following Sunday for 2.5 with filming and editing work throughout the week. If you or your organization is ready to encourage new storytellers with limited access to expensive equipment or software, come and join the Rebel Spirit Collective for this fun and interactive workshop.
Saturday, March 18th from 7am to 11am MDT/4pm to 8pm EAT and
Sunday, March 26th from 7am to 9:30am MDT/4pm to 6:30pm EAT
Course fee: $50
6-Month Creative Intensive
This cohort-based course will support the implementation of a decolonized communication strategy & team upskilling in video storytelling techniques. Teams will complete the entire lifecycle of reflection to ideation to implementation of a grassroots organizational storytelling process.
This course is designed to diversify the stories and storytellers from the grassroots and community development sectors. This is for novice filmmakers and focuses on documentary footage and formats. We highly recommend registering for this course if your organization is ready to change who tells the stories and needs to upskill new teams to do so AND/OR if your organization aspires to create impactful video stories.
Students will learn:
Setting realistic process & product outcomes
How to complete a decolonized media project with support from teams around the world
Technical skills associated with video storytelling
How to reflect and reset established communication practices
Participatory and decolonized frameworks and protocols to process
Summer: Tuesdays, July 18-January 16, 2023 from 7am to 9am MDT or MST. For East Africa Time, this course is from 4pm to 6pm from July 18 – October 31st and 5pm to 7pm from November 7th to January 16th because of Daylight Savings time in the US.
Course fee: $1200 per team of 3-5 staff at your organization. If you would like to register more than 5 staff, please purchase an additional ticket for each set of 5 staff.
For questions or more information, contact Maggie Larson at
FAQs
Is there a certificate for completing this course series?
Yes! There are multiple certificates offered. We offer one for the Data, Design, and Evaluation courses, and multiple for the Video Storytelling Series. Check out the sections above on “Certificates” under each program.
Are any of these courses worth academic credit?
No.
Is there any flexibility on payment amounts or timing?
There is always space to be flexible. Please inquire at
When do the courses meet?
We are offering courses at different points throughout the year and for different days and times. Please expand the “Course Details & Dates” sections above for more information.
Do I need to complete all courses?
Although we find great value in the full series, all courses are offered individually and can be taken singularly or together. We believe this is the best way to fit the needs and strategic planning for each organization. If you would like to earn a certificate, those have specific class requirements which you can find above in the program sections
How will I connect with the Posner Center Community as a praxis student?
While you are enrolled as a praxis student, you will have access to:
connections with the 200 organizations in the Posner Center Community
participation in the Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) Community of Practice, a peer network of MEL practitioners in various fields around the world
the Posner Center collaborative workspace near downtown Denver
other Posner Center programming, such as mentoring, coaching, decolonizing development, and other opportunities
Are praxis courses in person or virtual?
All praxis courses are fully virtual. praxis students in the Denver area are welcome to complete coursework or work from the Posner Center building from 8:30am-5:00pm during their course duration.
The Posner Center offers the praxis Certificate of Evidence-Based Development, a 5-course certificate designed to build your research and evaluation skills. Completion of 5 courses from the list below, attainable within six months or less, will earn you the certificate. To be considered as having completed a course, you must attend all classes, complete all assignments, and receive a grade of a B or higher.
