Across child care, education, and workforce development programs, each initiative we take on is unique. It is our job to bring the right expertise and questions that will aid in identifying and developing local solutions with local people. We harness the collective power of research + data + community engagement to develop programs and policies that are evidence-based, data-informed, and locally responsive. Public agencies have an imperative to ensure compliance and accountability; our intentionally built team brings every necessary skill set and system expertise together to create improved, effective, and sustainable programs and policies.

Our work starts with thoroughly understanding the goals and context for the task at hand and learning from others through research and the study of emerging and best practices. We are pragmatic optimists: we seek to identify parameters or guardrails for the possibilities of what we can design while pushing thinking to ‘what’s possible’. We hold true to our belief that we can’t design for people – we must design with them. Our iterative and collaborative design process seeks continuous improvement in program and policy development through input and feedback. We employ a collaborative meaning-making process to understand the information gathered. All of this moves us toward our ultimate goal: effective and sustainable solutions.

Great ideas abound, but implementation often falls short. As former policymakers and practitioners ourselves, we cringe at the thought of beautiful reports sitting on shelves! Afton Partners exists to make change happen and that requires thoughtful implementation. We’ll walk with you beyond program and policy development to see initiatives through to their impact. Our team possesses solid project planning and management capabilities, a knack for organizing messiness, and a commitment to engaging communities in solution-finding.