ST. PAUL, MN – The Minnesota Department of Human Rights (MDHR) launched its /mdhr/assets/rFinal_2018CivicEngagementUserGuide_t-opt_1.18.19_tcm1061-361141.pdfCivic Engagement User-Guide as part of its Meaningful Civic Engagement Makes a Difference website that provides tools and resources for government officials at the local, county and state levels to plan, coordinate and evaluate the effectiveness of their civic engagement efforts.

Meaningful civic engagement can make a difference in communities while creating better programs, services and policies for communities. Over the past few years, MDHR has worked with state agency leaders and members of the Diversity and Inclusion Council’s civic engagement committee to develop a user-guide based on best practices from pilot projects at state agencies throughout Minnesota.

“A Guide to Evaluate Civic Engagement” provides government officials a general framework to follow when embarking on evaluation of civic engagement work to ensure the engagement is meaningful and meets goals. The guide offers approaches, templates and lessons learned that serve as examples for government officials as they begin their journey of meaningful civic engagement.

“Minnesota is stronger when all people in our communities have the chance to share their talent, expertise and unique voices to shape our collective future,” MDHR Commissioner Kevin Lindsey said. “Meaningful civic engagement can make a difference in communities while creating better programs, services and policies for communities."

“Through the Department’s civic engagement work, MDHR receive input from government officials indicating that it would be helpful to their civic engagement efforts to have more tools to effectively measure civic engagement and to design a user guide,” Lindsey said. “MDHR designed this user guide as a process to follow when embarking on the first steps of your evaluation journey. Our hope is we can build bridges between government and communities by sharing these resources and best practices.”

At MDHR’s 2018 Human Rights Symposium on Dec. 4 at the University of Minnesota Continuing Education Center in St. Paul, Daren Nyquist of the Improve Group, will present on civic engagement measurement and discuss best practices and the civic engagement user guide.

If you believe you have been discriminated against in violation of the Minnesota Human Rights Act, please contact MDHR’s enforcement unit at 651.539.1100, 1.800.657.3704 or online at mn.gov/mdhr/intake. For more information about disability discrimination, please visit mn.gov/mdhr or follow the conversation on Twitter at @mnhumanrights.

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