PAVE Pathways: Continuing Education Kits, Built by People Who Lived It
The PAVE Pathways catalog spans 225 continuing education topics across nine practice domains. Each kit is a self-contained training package with a facilitator guide, participant workbook, slide deck, and post-test, written for peer specialists and the behavioral health and public health teams that supervise them. Kits are designed to be delivered as-is or adapted to an organization's existing training calendar and documentation requirements.
Available now
LifeSync and Purpose
What Is LifeSync?
Finding the Place Where Who You Are Meets How You Live
This complete, facilitator-ready training kit introduces PAVE's purpose-alignment framework, showing how to find harmony between who a person is, what they love, and how they live day to day. It adapts the Ikigai model for peer-led growth rather than corporate goal setting, and frames purpose as an ongoing practice of alignment across personal values, professional skills, and community impact. Grounded in positive psychology, purpose-in-life research, and longevity studies. Written in plain, warm language for adult learners, including people in recovery and people returning from incarceration who are now doing this work.
Understanding Survival, Building Trauma-Informed Support
Most people who struggle with substances are carrying pain that started long before the first use. This complete, facilitator-ready training kit helps frontline staff, peer leaders, and justice-impacted program teams understand how trauma and chronic stress sensitize the brain's threat-detection systems, why substance use so often works as an adaptive way to regulate overwhelming emotional pain, and how to build support around the three core trauma-informed principles of safety, choice, and empowerment. Grounded in SAMHSA, NIDA, the CDC-Kaiser ACE Study, and the National Child Traumatic Stress Network. Written in plain, warm language for adult learners, including people in active recovery and people returning from incarceration.
Shame is one of the strongest forces keeping people stuck in substance use cycles, and it is one of the least directly addressed in most programs. This complete, facilitator-ready training kit helps peer specialists, counselors, and reentry staff teach the difference between "I did something bad" and "I am bad," show how shame drives secrecy, isolation, and return to use, and practice cognitive tools and self-forgiveness steps that disarm self-stigma. Grounded in SAMHSA, NIDA, CCAR, and the research base on shame, guilt, and stigma in recovery. Written in plain, warm language for adult learners, including people in active recovery and people returning from incarceration.
The people doing the supporting carry a load nobody talks about. This complete, facilitator-ready training kit helps peer specialists, recovery coaches, caregivers, and frontline staff recognize the early warning signs of compassion fatigue, tell the difference between healthy empathy and absorbing other people's pain, and build steady practices for peer debriefing, reflection, and firm emotional boundaries. Grounded in SAMHSA, NIDA, CCAR, and the research base on secondary traumatic stress and burnout. Written in plain, warm language for adult learners, including people in recovery and people returning from incarceration who are now doing this work.
Building Trust First: Community Engagement for Programs People Actually Show Up To
Why Trust Comes Before Outreach, and How to Earn It
This complete, facilitator-ready training kit teaches outreach and engagement staff how to build the kind of trust that turns a flyer into a full room, especially with communities that have been let down by outside organizations before. It treats trust as something earned through consistency and follow-through, not something assumed because an organization means well, and it gives practical, low-cost ways to meet people where they are. Built on community engagement and community-based participatory research guidance, and written in plain, warm language for adult learners, including peer specialists, outreach workers, and people in recovery or returning from incarceration who are now doing this work.
Finding and Winning Small Grants: Resource Development for Grassroots Programs
A Peer-Led Approach to Funding Real Community Work
This complete, facilitator-ready training kit gives peer-led organizations without a dedicated development team a clear, step-by-step process for finding, applying for, and managing small grants that fund real community work. It treats grant writing as a learnable skill rather than a mystery reserved for people with advanced degrees, and it is honest about the paperwork and follow-through required after the money arrives. Built on established funder guidance and nonprofit capacity-building research, and written in plain, warm language for adult learners, including peer specialists, grassroots organizers, and people in recovery or returning from incarceration who are now running or supporting programs.
From Peer to Leader: Growing Into Leadership Without Losing Your Roots
Mentorship Skills for Peer Specialists Stepping Into Their First Leadership Role
This complete, facilitator-ready training kit supports peer specialists and frontline staff who are stepping into supervisory or mentorship roles for the first time, often without any formal management training. It treats the shift from being a peer among peers to holding a leadership role as an identity change that deserves real preparation, not just a new title, and it is honest that carrying responsibility for others can put a leader's own recovery and wellbeing at risk if they do not protect it. Built on established peer supervision, mentorship, and workforce development guidance, and written in warm, plain language for adult learners, including people in recovery or returning from incarceration who are now stepping into these roles.
Measuring What Matters: Simple Evaluation for Programs That Don't Have a Data Team
Tracking Outcomes and Telling Your Program's Real Story Without a Statistics Degree
This complete, facilitator-ready training kit gives frontline staff and program leads a plain-language way to track outcomes and tell their program's real story, without needing a statistics background or expensive software. It draws a clear line between counting activity and measuring impact, and it treats data collection as a habit the team can actually sustain, not a burden bolted on to satisfy a funder. Built on established nonprofit evaluation and outcomes measurement guidance, and written in warm, plain language for adult learners, including peer specialists, program coordinators, and people in recovery or returning from incarceration who are now running or supporting programs.
Honoring Survivors, Building Whole-Person Wellness
More than half of people living with diagnosed HIV in the United States are now age 50 or older. This complete, facilitator-ready training kit helps frontline staff and peer leaders recognize the medical, cognitive, and emotional realities of aging with HIV, including AIDS Survivor Syndrome, and apply PAVE's R.A.C.E. framework and the MIPA principle to build programs that honor long-term survivors as experts, not afterthoughts. Grounded in HIV.gov, NIH HIVinfo, the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program, and the San Francisco AIDS Foundation.
One representative topic from each of the nine practice domains, in development now. These previews show the shape of the kits being built next.
AddictionComing Soon
Understanding Cravings
A practical look at how cravings function in the brain and body, and how to navigate them without automatic reaction.
ADD-1.2 · In development
HIV and Chronic IllnessComing Soon
Living Well With HIV
Shifts focus from medical management to designing a vibrant, joyful life centered on wellness, hope, and personal growth.
HIV-3.23 · In development
See all available kits
Pick a practice domain to see the 25 topics inside it, each with its learning objective and core focus areas.
ImpactTrack and Evaluation
25 topics
Featured kit, ready to order
Measuring What Matters: Simple Evaluation for Programs That Don't Have a Data Team
Tracking Outcomes and Telling Your Program's Real Story Without a Statistics Degree
This complete, facilitator-ready training kit gives frontline staff and program leads a plain-language way to track outcomes and tell their program's real story, without needing a statistics background or expensive software. It draws a clear line between counting activity and measuring impact, and it treats data collection as a habit the team can actually sustain, not a burden bolted on to satisfy a funder. Built on established nonprofit evaluation and outcomes measurement guidance, and written in warm, plain language for adult learners, including peer specialists, program coordinators, and people in recovery or returning from incarceration who are now running or supporting programs.
Many small organizations only think about evaluation when a funder asks for it. This kit takes program evaluation out of the world of jargon and academic research and puts it into plain, everyday language. Staff learn what evaluation actually means, why it matters beyond satisfying a grant report, and how it fits naturally into the work they are already doing. By the end, evaluation feels less like a chore imposed from outside and more like a tool the team owns.
Learning objective: Help staff understand what program evaluation is and why it matters, without needing a research background.
What skills you will learn: The difference between monitoring and evaluation, the three main types of evaluation, and how evaluation fits into everyday program work.
How this applies in the field: Any program can use this foundation to start tracking whether its work is actually making a difference, not just staying busy.
Coming SoonITE-8.3
Designing Effective Pre- and Post-Training Surveys
A training session can feel successful in the room and still leave no proof that anyone learned anything. This kit teaches staff how to build short, simple surveys that measure real change in knowledge and confidence, given before and after a training. Participants learn how to match questions across both surveys so the comparison actually means something, instead of guessing at impact.
Learning objective: Build the skill to design a pre- and post-survey pair that measures true change from a training.
What skills you will learn: How to match questions across both surveys, measure knowledge and confidence separately, and keep surveys short enough that people finish them.
How this applies in the field: Any trainer or facilitator can use this method to show funders, supervisors, and themselves that a session actually worked.
Coming SoonITE-8.4
Writing Clear, Unbiased Survey Questions
A poorly worded survey question can quietly ruin an entire evaluation before the first response comes in. This kit focuses on the specific skill of writing questions that gather honest, usable answers instead of confusing or leading participants toward a certain response. Staff practice spotting and fixing common wording problems before a survey ever goes out the door.
Learning objective: Learn to write survey questions that are clear, neutral, and easy for any participant to answer honestly.
What skills you will learn: Common wording traps like leading and double-barreled questions, how to choose the right answer scale, and the value of testing questions before rollout.
How this applies in the field: This skill improves every survey a program ever sends out, from training evaluations to community needs assessments.
Coming SoonITE-8.5
Qualitative vs. Quantitative Data Collection
Numbers and stories tell different parts of the same truth. This kit walks staff through the difference between quantitative data, like counts and rates, and qualitative data, like quotes and themes from participants. Rather than treating one as more real than the other, the training shows how combining both creates a fuller, more honest picture of what a program is actually doing.
Learning objective: Understand the strengths and limits of both quantitative and qualitative data, and when each one is the right tool.
What skills you will learn: Real examples of both data types, and simple ways to combine them in a single report or evaluation.
How this applies in the field: Programs of any size can use this thinking to avoid over-relying on numbers alone or stories alone.
Coming SoonITE-8.6
Collecting Data From Training Sessions
Gathering data during a live training can feel like it interrupts the learning, if it is not planned well. This kit gives facilitators practical, low-tech ways to collect useful information from participants without breaking the flow of the session. Staff also learn how to keep data collection consistent across multiple trainers and multiple sessions, so results can be trusted and compared.
Learning objective: Learn practical methods for collecting data during a live training session without disrupting the learning experience.
What skills you will learn: Timing strategies for surveys and check-ins, low-tech collection tools, and how to keep data consistent across different facilitators.
How this applies in the field: Any agency running regular trainings can use this to build a simple, repeatable data habit instead of starting from scratch each time.
Coming SoonITE-8.7
Tracking Programmatic Data Within an Agency
Many agencies collect far more paperwork than they actually use. This kit helps staff figure out which data points genuinely inform decisions, and which ones just create extra work. Participants learn to build simple intake and tracking forms that staff will actually complete accurately, and how to avoid collecting the same information more than once across different programs.
Learning objective: Learn to identify which ongoing data points actually matter for decision-making inside an agency.
What skills you will learn: How to design simple tracking forms, and how to spot and eliminate duplicate data collection across programs.
How this applies in the field: Any organization can use this to reduce paperwork burden while actually improving the usefulness of the data it keeps.
Coming SoonITE-8.8
Choosing the Right Data Collection Tools
Small agencies do not need expensive software to collect good data. This kit reviews low-cost and free tools, from paper forms to spreadsheets to simple digital surveys, and helps staff match the right tool to their team's comfort level and technical skill. It also covers what to check for so the tool chosen still meets funder and privacy requirements.
Learning objective: Learn how to evaluate and choose data collection tools that fit a small agency's budget and skill level.
What skills you will learn: A comparison of paper, spreadsheet, and digital survey options, and the privacy and funder requirements each must meet.
How this applies in the field: Agencies of any size can use this to stop over-investing in tools no one on staff can actually use.
Coming SoonITE-8.9
Setting Up Simple Data Systems for Small Agencies
Without a dedicated data person, information often ends up scattered across a dozen spreadsheets no one fully understands. This kit shows agencies how to build one central, sustainable system instead, with clear roles for who enters data and who reviews it. The goal is a system small enough to maintain, but strong enough to actually answer the questions leadership needs answered.
Learning objective: Learn to design one central data system that a small agency can realistically maintain long term.
What skills you will learn: How to assign data entry and review roles, and how to build in regular time to clean and check the data.
How this applies in the field: Any agency without a dedicated data staff person can use this to move from scattered files to one reliable system.
Coming SoonITE-8.10
Process Evaluation vs. Outcome Evaluation
Knowing a program ran smoothly is not the same as knowing it actually worked. This kit clarifies the difference between process evaluation, which looks at how a program was delivered, and outcome evaluation, which looks at whether it changed something for participants. Staff learn to use both together to get a complete, honest picture of program performance.
Learning objective: Understand the difference between measuring how a program runs and measuring whether it works.
What skills you will learn: The specific factors process evaluation tracks, like fidelity and reach, and the specific factors outcome evaluation tracks, like behavior change.
How this applies in the field: Any program can use this distinction to avoid confusing a smooth rollout with real impact.
Coming SoonITE-8.11
Identifying Key Performance Indicators
Tracking everything usually means understanding nothing. This kit teaches staff to narrow in on a small number of key performance indicators that genuinely reflect whether a program is succeeding. Participants practice choosing indicators that are realistic to measure, directly tied to program goals, and useful enough to act on, instead of collecting data simply because it is possible.
Learning objective: Learn to select a small set of key indicators that truly reflect program success.
What skills you will learn: Criteria for choosing measurable, relevant, and actionable indicators, and how to revisit them as a program matures.
How this applies in the field: Any program can use this to stop drowning in data and start focusing on what actually matters.
Coming SoonITE-8.12
Logic Models as Evaluation Tools
A logic model is not just a planning document, it can also guide an entire evaluation plan. This kit shows staff how to use the logic model they may have already built to identify exactly what data to collect and when to collect it. The training also covers how to share the model with staff so everyone understands how their daily work connects to the bigger picture.
Learning objective: Learn to use a logic model as a working tool for planning an evaluation, not just a funder requirement.
What skills you will learn: How to map outputs and outcomes to specific evaluation questions, and how to use the model to build shared staff understanding.
How this applies in the field: Any program with a logic model already in hand can use this kit to put it to real, ongoing use.
Coming SoonITE-8.13
Conducting Interviews for Program Feedback
A well run interview can surface honest feedback a survey never could. This kit builds on core interviewing skills and applies them specifically to gathering feedback about program quality and impact. Staff learn how to structure questions around real program goals, create a comfortable and non-judgmental space, and document what participants say accurately, without changing its meaning.
Learning objective: Learn to conduct one-on-one interviews that gather honest, useful feedback about a program.
What skills you will learn: How to structure interview questions around program goals, and how to create a safe, non-judgmental interview environment.
How this applies in the field: Any staff member can use this skill to gather deeper feedback than a survey alone would ever capture.
Coming SoonITE-8.14
Using Focus Groups for Program Evaluation
Focus groups can reveal patterns that individual feedback misses. This kit applies focus group facilitation specifically to program evaluation, teaching staff how to recruit a group that truly represents the people a program serves, ask evaluative questions about what worked and what did not, and pull the group's shared themes into clear evaluation findings.
Learning objective: Learn to plan and facilitate a focus group specifically for evaluating a program's strengths and gaps.
What skills you will learn: Recruitment strategies for a representative group, question design for evaluation purposes, and how to synthesize group discussion into findings.
How this applies in the field: Any program can use focus groups to gather rich, shared feedback that strengthens both current work and future funding proposals.
Coming SoonITE-8.15
Data Privacy and Confidentiality Basics
Programs working with people affected by HIV, addiction, or the justice system are handling some of the most sensitive information a person has. This kit covers the foundational privacy and confidentiality practices every staff member needs, from understanding HIPAA basics to storing information securely, whether on paper or on a computer, and getting real informed consent before anything is collected.
Learning objective: Understand the basic ethical and legal responsibilities that come with collecting sensitive community data.
What skills you will learn: HIPAA and confidentiality basics, secure storage practices for paper and digital data, and what informed consent actually requires.
How this applies in the field: Every staff member who touches participant data, in any program, needs this foundation to protect the people they serve.
Coming SoonITE-8.16
Cleaning and Organizing Raw Data
Raw data is almost never ready to use the moment it is collected. This kit walks staff through the practical, unglamorous work of finding and fixing duplicate or incomplete entries, standardizing how names, dates, and categories are recorded, and building a simple routine the team can repeat every time, instead of starting from scratch with every report.
Learning objective: Learn the practical steps needed to turn messy raw data into something a team can actually use.
What skills you will learn: How to spot duplicate or incomplete entries, standardize formats, and build a repeatable cleaning routine.
How this applies in the field: Any agency collecting data in spreadsheets or paper forms can use this to make its numbers trustworthy before reporting on them.
Coming SoonITE-8.17
Basic Data Analysis for Non-Researchers
A statistics degree is not required to understand what a program's data is saying. This kit introduces simple, accessible ways to analyze information, like calculating averages, percentages, and basic trends, using tools most staff already have access to. It also helps participants recognize the point where a question is complex enough to bring in outside evaluation expertise.
Learning objective: Build confidence and basic skill in analyzing program data without a research background.
What skills you will learn: How to calculate simple averages, percentages, and trends, and how to sort and summarize data in a spreadsheet.
How this applies in the field: Any staff member responsible for reporting can use these basic skills to understand and explain their own program's numbers.
Coming SoonITE-8.18
Turning Data Into a Story: Reporting Findings
The best data in the world does not help anyone if the report explaining it goes unread. This kit bridges analysis and communication, teaching staff to lead with the finding that matters most, pair numbers with real participant quotes and stories, and shape the same information differently depending on whether the audience is a funder, a staff team, or the community.
Learning objective: Learn to turn raw findings into a report that funders and staff will actually read and understand.
What skills you will learn: How to lead with the headline finding, pair data with participant stories, and adjust a report for different audiences.
How this applies in the field: Any program can use this to make its reporting more persuasive and more likely to inform real decisions.
Coming SoonITE-8.19
Data Visualization Basics for Program Reports
A cluttered chart can confuse a reader more than plain numbers would. This kit introduces the basics of choosing the right chart or graph for the data at hand, avoiding visuals that mislead or overwhelm, and using color and labels to add clarity instead of decoration. Staff finish able to build simple, honest visuals for any report.
Learning objective: Learn to choose and build simple, clear visuals that make program data easier to understand at a glance.
What skills you will learn: How to match chart type to data type, and how to avoid cluttered or misleading visuals.
How this applies in the field: Any staff member preparing a funder report or board presentation can use this to communicate data more clearly.
Coming SoonITE-8.20
Evaluating Trainer and Facilitator Effectiveness
Peer educators and facilitators deserve honest, useful feedback on their work, not just a passing grade. This kit provides simple tools for observing and assessing training quality, and teaches the important skill of separating feedback on content from feedback on delivery. The goal throughout is coaching and growth, never punishment.
Learning objective: Learn to assess and improve the quality of peer educators and facilitators using clear, fair tools.
What skills you will learn: How to design simple observation and feedback forms, and how to separate content quality from delivery quality.
How this applies in the field: Any organization that trains peer educators can use this to build a culture of coaching instead of judgment.
Coming SoonITE-8.21
Measuring Long-Term Program Outcomes
The hardest data to gather is often the data that matters most, whether a program's impact lasted. This kit addresses the real challenges of tracking outcomes months or years after a program ends, from designing realistic follow-up surveys to respecting participant privacy during long-term tracking, and setting honest expectations for how many people will actually respond.
Learning objective: Learn practical strategies for tracking a program's impact well beyond its initial end date.
What skills you will learn: How to design realistic follow-up surveys, protect participant privacy over time, and set honest response rate expectations.
How this applies in the field: Any program aiming to prove lasting change, not just short-term results, can use this to build a credible long-term picture.
Coming SoonITE-8.22
Using Data to Improve Program Design
Evaluation only matters if it actually changes something. This kit closes the loop between collecting data and using it, teaching staff to build regular data review sessions into their program calendar, prioritize changes based on what the data actually shows rather than assumptions, and communicate those changes clearly back to both staff and the community.
Learning objective: Learn to turn evaluation findings into real, actionable changes to program design.
What skills you will learn: How to build regular data review habits, prioritize changes based on evidence, and communicate updates back to the team.
How this applies in the field: Any program can use this to make sure evaluation results actually improve the work, instead of sitting in a drawer.
Coming SoonITE-8.23
Common Pitfalls in Program Evaluation
Most evaluation mistakes are avoidable once you know what to look for. This kit reviews the most frequent errors small agencies make, like collecting data no one ever reviews, promising outcomes an evaluation was never designed to measure, or treating evaluation as a single event instead of an ongoing habit, and gives staff practical ways to steer clear of each one.
Learning objective: Learn to recognize and avoid the most common mistakes made in program evaluation.
What skills you will learn: Real examples of unused data, overpromised outcomes, and one-time evaluation efforts, and how to prevent each.
How this applies in the field: Any organization at any stage of building its evaluation practice can use this to avoid wasted effort.
Coming SoonITE-8.24
Sharing Evaluation Results With Funders and Stakeholders
The same set of findings needs to sound different depending on who is reading them. This kit teaches staff to present results honestly and persuasively to funders, staff, and community members alike, including how to share shortfalls alongside successes without losing credibility, and how to use results to strengthen future grant renewals and proposals.
Learning objective: Learn to present evaluation findings clearly and honestly to different audiences.
What skills you will learn: How to tailor the same findings for funders, staff, and community members, and how to present shortfalls honestly.
How this applies in the field: Any program reporting to a funder or board can use this to build more trust and stronger renewal proposals.
Coming SoonITE-8.25
Building a Culture of Data and Continuous Improvement
This capstone kit shows agencies how to make data a normal, welcomed part of everyday practice rather than a once-a-year scramble before a report is due. Staff learn to normalize data conversations in regular staff meetings, celebrate what the data shows is working, not just what is broken, and embed continuous improvement as a shared value across the whole organization.
Learning objective: Learn how to build a lasting culture where data and continuous improvement are part of everyday agency practice.
What skills you will learn: How to normalize data conversations in staff meetings, and how to celebrate wins alongside honest problem-solving.
How this applies in the field: Any agency ready to move beyond one-time evaluations can use this to make data a genuine part of its culture.
