Street Storage

This page is a summary of the collaboration between Street Storage and UCL postgraduate students and researchers through the Evaluation Exchange.

Street Storage provides people experiencing homelessness (including those sleeping out, in vulnerable housing situations, leaving violent home situations or in the prison system) with free, secure and accessible storage for their belongings.

How we worked with the Evaluation Exchange

Boxes stacked in a room for street storage

We focused on developing simple tools for people using Street Storage’s services to feed back on the service. The aim was to find creative and non-intrusive ways to collate and collect data from a group for whom feedback on a service is not a priority - and for whom surveys and online forms are not an option.

The group came up with some fantastic and creative ideas that do not strain staff time or overtake the more pressing priorities of our beneficiaries. Ideas came from the student group and from the two Evaluation Exchange sessions online (the wider team at UCL and charities working alongside them).

The student and researcher group also looked at ways to collect statistical data more professionally using Salesforce and how to report the impact of this data monetarily and emotionally. It was very practical. The students and researchers met us at the stage that our charity is at, rather than providing grandiose and unachievable goals.

Legacy for Street Storage

We now have three or four creative feedback collation techniques in place and a solid statistical reporting system (demographics, length of storage, outcomes). Both these can be implemented with immediate effect and in place for the future to improve impact reporting and secure sustainable funding based on proven impact.

Legacy for the students and researchers

We found the sign-post from the Evaluation Exchange Delivery Team to the M&E Universe resources very useful. While the data stage we reached was a starting point it was a really good chance to see how early planning of data collection can be inbuilt into daily practice and then lead to a useful outcome to build up a cycle. As in research! It was very satisfying to see the real-life application of data, and we would be interested to do more.

Students and researchers involved

Jasmine Cockroft (PhD student, Psychology and Human Development)
Eoin Laws-Quinn (PhD student, Molecular Biology)
Madalina Mironiuc (PhD student Physics and Astronomy)

Resources from the collaboration

Find out more about the Evaluation Exchange