Explore Research and Evaluation at WIND
At the Wyoming Institute for Disabilities (WIND), our research and evaluation efforts are grounded in community collaboration and real-world impact. The Equality State Research Network supports community and practice-based research that brings together healthcare providers, educators, and advocates across Wyoming to improve systems and services. Get to know the professionals driving this work on our Faculty and Staff page, where you’ll meet WIND’s research and evaluation team. To see the outcomes of these efforts, visit our Publications and Products page and explore recently completed reports, tools, and other resources designed to support data-informed decision-making.
Research and Evaluation Projects
Evaluation Services
Research staff designs and implements evaluation projects for federal and state agencies, non-profit groups, and university departments.
Equality State Research Network (ESRN)
ESRN empowers community members to shape the research process using Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) methods that address real-world challenges across Wyoming.
Publications
Explore peer-reviewed publications and research outputs that inform Wyoming policy, health, and education systems.
REsearch and Evaluation Projects
The Research & Evaluation team supports UW ECHO Networks by measuring outcomes like knowledge, skills, and connection-building among Wyoming educators, families and health professionals. ECHO programs focus on mentorship and increasing expertise to improve services for families, educators, and patients. Check out the ECHO networks available.
The goal of this project is to evaluate the outcomes of the ECHO model as a method of professional development to:
- Increase the capacity of general educators in rural areas to support students with autism spectrum disorder and related behavioral challenges
- Improve educational outcomes of students by empowering educators with skills and knowledge that will allow them to be more effective, and, improve general educator effectiveness and reduce burnout among rural educators.
Screening and diagnosis of autism is a complex process that is often the first step to accessing services. A growing body of research is finding that the tools used to identify autism work differently in various sociodemographic groups. We have used several different tools to explore why this happens, and how to create screening and diagnostic tools that perform similarly regardless of sociodemographic background.
Project ECHO is more than just a professional development model—it’s designed to foster Communities of Practice (CoP): groups of professionals who share a common interest and grow their knowledge and skills by learning together over time. Through regular, case-based learning sessions, ECHO participants collaborate, share expertise, and build supportive networks.
Our team is exploring whether ECHO networks at the University of Wyoming actually result in the development of CoPs. While ECHO was created with this purpose in mind, no formal studies have yet confirmed the emergence of CoPs in these settings. Moreover, there are no validated instruments currently available to measure CoP development in virtual environments like ECHO.
To address this gap, we are testing a newly developed tool that assesses the formation and strength of Communities of Practice across several UW ECHO networks. This work will help us better understand how virtual professional learning models contribute to knowledge sharing, skill development, and network building among rural educators and health professionals.
- Measuring how often PWD access Title X services
- Identifying challenges in reproductive and mental health care
- Co-developing solutions with stakeholders
- Building a research strategy to expand this work across Wyoming
The Equality State Research Network is a community and practice-based research network that brings the ideas of community members across Wyoming to identify important community health, wellbeing, and education challenges and opportunities.
The ESRN welcomes any community member interested in partnership with researchers at the University of Wyoming to develop innovative research that addresses challenges unique to your communities.
Please contact esrn@uwyo.edu to learn more about ways to get involved in community-based research.
