On July 24th, CEA hosted our annual summer social event at the White Sox game vs the Astros. If you've been a member for a while you may be familiar with our annual Music in the Park social event the past few years. Well this year we decided to switch things up. Although the White Sox didn't win (they did pull through and beat the Astros on Sunday though!), we still had a great time and even got to end the night with some fireworks!

We hope to see you at the next one!

Early Bird registration is open for the Ninth International CREA Conference, October 6-9 in Chicago, IL. This year's theme is Future-Forward in Cultural Responsiveness: Opportunity, Equity, Evidence, and Innovation. "Future-forward cultural responsiveness calls us to consider not only what is, but also what can be and what must be different."

This year’s CREA IX conference is addressing:

• Uncertainty and possibility.
• Acceleration and disruption.
• Innovation and inequity.
• Promise and precarity.

Register by July 31st to save!

Ready to head to Charlotte, North Carolina November 16-20 for the American Evaluation Association’s (AEA) annual conference? This year’s conference is being shaped by a significant redesign, with changes intended to make the conference easier to navigate and offer stronger learning and community building opportunities for attendees.

What’s going to be different, you ask? Well, the main difference is how conference sessions are organized; rather than organizing sessions by TIG sector or content area, sessions will now be organized around five broad professional learning streams that are organized around the ways evaluators practice, learn, innovate, and strengthen the profession:

• Foundations and Core Practice – focuses on core evaluation practices, theory, ethics, standards, and fundamentals of professional practice.
• Design, Methods, Evidence, and Use – focuses on evaluation methods, design, data analysis, evidence generation, use, AI-enabled methods, and methodological innovation.
• Equity, Culture, and Justice in Evaluation - makes equity a core professional learning area and focuses on: culturally responsive evaluation, equity-centered practice; indigenous evaluation; social justice; community voice and inclusion and representation.
• Innovation, Complexity, Systems, and Futures - focuses on systems thinking; complexity-aware evaluation; emerging technologies; AI, foresight and futures thinking; and innovative approaches to evaluation.
• Building Professional Community Within and Beyond AEA - focuses strengthening evaluators through career development, mentoring, leadership, professional identity, collaboration, and building the profession itself.

The redesign was driven by several factors. With more than 50 TIGs, it was becoming increasingly difficult to reduce duplicated sessions and attendees often found the program  difficult to navigate. AEA also sought to improve equitable access to presentation opportunities while also responding to declining conference participation, rising conference costs, and increased staffing demands.

In addition to creating the five streams, AEA implemented a robust conference proposal  selection process. Although proposals are now submitted through the five streams rather than individual TIGs, TIG members continue to play an important role in the review process by serving as individual reviewers and Stream Team members. Proposals were reviewed individually and then sent to a Stream Team that had the un-enviable task of selecting just 10 proposals - out of many, many more proposals - to ensure a diverse and robust set of sessions. Proposals not selected for a session could be recommended to be presented as a poster or Roundtable session.

Change always brings a measure of uncertainty, but it also creates opportunities. This year's conference will give all of us an opportunity to experience a new model, connect across new and traditional boundaries, and continue to shape the next chapter of AEA.

AEA conference registration is now open! Get early bird pricing until October 12th.

The CQI Community invites you to submit a proposal for the 2026 Annual CQI Community Conference. This year's theme is "From Surviving to Thriving: The Next Chapter of CQI". The conference will be held October 13 & 14, 2026 at the I Hotel and Conference Center in Champaign, IL.

This year’s conference focuses on how CQI helps organizations stabilize what matters most, strengthen relationships and processes, and build the capacity to sustain meaningful improvement over time. Sessions will highlight practical tools, lessons learned from the field, and forward-thinking approaches that help teams move from managing challenges to creating environments where people, services, and systems can truly excel.

We are seeking proposals that provide practical, proven, or promising CQI strategies, methods, and tools. Strong proposals will demonstrate how improvement efforts help organizations strengthen systems, support people, and create lasting impact.

Find all the details on what type of presentation styles we are looking for, a list of suggested topics, and how to submit a proposal for this year's CQI Conference on our website: https://cqi.cfrc.illinois.edu/con_info.php

Proposals are due Friday, May 1, 2026. To submit a proposal, use this link: RFP Application

If you want to learn more about submitting a proposal, we have a virtual information session coming up on Wednesday, April 22, 2026: 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM CDT. Register here: Virtual RFP Information Session

Please email the cqicommunity@gmail.com with any questions.

Last Thursday, CEA hosted their first event of 2026! This happy hour/social event was a time for us to come together in community and just get to know one another a little better. 

We want to give a big thank you to everyone who came out! It was definitely a joyful occasion. 

We hope to see you at our next event!