LOGIC MODELS

This paper addresses situations where a private foundation designs an initiative and awards grants to a number of sites to participate in the initiative in their local setting. The basic ideas are applicable to other situations.

What is a Logic Model?

The term "logic model" comes from the evaluation field, but these models don’t just belong to evaluators or the evaluation plan. As the term suggests, they are a basic element of programming that communicates the logic behind a program, its rationale. A logic model’s purpose is to communicate the underlying "theory" or set of assumptions or hypotheses that program proponents have about why the program will work, or about why it is a good solution to an identified problem.

Logic models are typically diagraming, flow sheets, or some other type of visual schematic that conveys relationships between contextual factors and programmatic inputs, processes, and outcomes. Logic models can come in all shapes and sizes: boxes with connecting lines that are read from left to right (or top to bottom); circular loops with arrows going in or out; or other visual metaphors and devices. What