Pinning down the intangible: applying digital storytelling as an evaluation tool

Digital Storytelling will be applied as an evaluation approach to explore the experiences of a group of volunteers (up to 15 participants) involved in eight Know Your Neighbourhood projects across County Durham, promoted and supported by Point North.
The hybrid nature of the Digital Storytelling, combining narrative/creative processes and use of technology to develop the final output, makes it a powerful and flexible tool for participatory action research and to build social empathy.
Digital Storytelling will be used to help Point North evaluate and measure the impact of their activities and projects selected for this pilot project.
As a result of this pilot project, we envisage the following benefits:
• Participants will see their experience as valuable to the wider community;
• They will also learn new and foster existing creative and technical skills for the production of digital stories (2-3 minute videos combining a voiceover with still or moving image);
• Intergenerational conversations supported by co-creation and collaboration during the digital storytelling process.