The Student Consulting Lab is a collaboration between small teams of Evans School students, their faculty advisors, and our public, private, and nonprofit partners to co-create solutions to policy and organizational problems.
Application submissions for the 2025–2026 academic year are closed, but we’d love to stay connected!
Learn more about Student Consulting Labs or share your project idea via the form below.
Benefits to Partners
We are proud that this program has built organizational capacity for more than 20 years with support from our MPA students. We have delivered powerful recommendations for organizations and improved equitable outcomes for everyone in our shared community. By partnering with a Student Consulting Lab project, your organization will:
-
- Gain fresh insights and data-driven solutions. Our student teams bring advanced analytical skills, policy expertise, and a fresh perspective to tackle complex challenges in the public and nonprofit sectors.
- Advance strategic priorities with extra capacity. Consulting teams dedicate 120+ hours per project, providing valuable research, evaluation, and implementation support that complements your internal efforts, all at a low-cost.
- Collaborate with mission-driven graduate students. Evans School students are emerging leaders in public service, passionate about making a difference. You’ll work directly with a team selected to match your project’s scope and goals.
- Strengthen your pipeline of future talent. Many organizations use Student Consulting Lab as a way to connect with and recruit top-performing graduate students with policy, management, and data expertise.
- Contribute to student learning and public impact. Your partnership provides a meaningful, real-world experience for students while generating actionable deliverables that support your mission.
How It Works
Under the guidance of faculty advisors, teams of three to five skilled, second-year Master of Public Administration (MPA) students dedicate approximately 10-12 hours per week to their selected projects over a five-month period.
Participation in the Student Consulting Lab includes a project fee of $2,500. If the project fee is a financial barrier to participation we also provide fee waivers, which can be requested through the proposal form.
What makes a good proposal?
- A feasible program scope for a team of three to five consultants and a five-month timeline
- A clearly-stated problem, challenge, or opportunity to be addressed by the project
- An emphasis on value-added research that can be conducted by an offsite team
- Clear and achievable deliverables, including but not limited to written reports, presentations to decision-makers or board officers, or tools to aid in program implementation
- Alignment with the Evans School mission: The Evans School of Public Policy & Governance educates leaders, generates knowledge, and hosts communities to co-create solutions to pressing societal problems.
Past Projects
A Gap Analysis for Funding Homelessness Initiatives Across the Greater Puget Sound Region
The Medina Foundation is a private family foundation working to improve lives by funding human service organizations that provide direct support to Puget Sound residents. The purpose of this study was to assess how Medina can strategically allocate their funding towards homelessness initiatives so that they may make a more significant impact within their grantmaking region. This study sought to answer the following question: What criteria can the Medina Foundation use when assessing grant applications for homelessness initiatives? The student team assessed each county within the grantmaking region for level of need, history and level of funding, subpopulations living in homelessness, and intervention types most likely to make an impact as part of their research process.
Planning for the Future: Assessing the Legacy of the Growth Management Act and Potential Policy Alternatives in the Puget Sound Region
The Puget Sound Partnership (Partnership) is the state agency formed to support the region’s collective effort to restore and protect Puget Sound. This capstone analyzed how the Washington Growth Management Act and mandated comprehensive planning have shaped the Puget Sound region since their passage and how they address environmental justice, include federally recognized tribes in decision-making, and advance ecosystem priorities. The findings and recommendations presented in this report will further develop approaches to managing growth that minimize negative ecosystem impacts and enhance restoration objectives, while also advancing environmental justice and tribal collaboration.
Please add button text.Proposal
Please add button text.Report
Strategic Fundraising for Social Impact: Analysis of Prospective Donors and Recommendations
The BOMA Project is a nonprofit organization that provides poverty graduation programs to ultra-poor pastoralist women in the arid lands of Africa. Following a $10 million grant from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, the BOMA Project seeks to shift their fundraising efforts to target corporate and high-net-worth individuals (HNWI). Using a mixed-methods approach, we conducted research on ways to target corporate foundations and HNWI based on sectors specific to BOMA’s work (women’s empowerment, climate change, pastoral/agriculture, entrepreneurship). Additionally, utilizing Candid’s Foundation Directory Online tool, we identified substantial foundations and corporations for each sector that will allow BOMA to engage in these donor regions. Based on our research and analysis, our recommendations are four-fold: focus efforts on corporate foundations; hire an internal prospect research staff member; explore alternative platforms for donor engagement; and facilitate deeper prospect research
Washington State COVID-19 Vaccination: Strategies for Expediting a Safe and Equitable Recovery
Established in May 2020, the nonprofit RESTART Partners aims to guide small businesses in Washington State toward reopening their operations safely through dissemination of PPE, communication materials, and vaccine information. This capstone project utilized virtual key informant interviews, data-driven COVID-19 dashboards, media releases, and a literature review to recommend and explore communication best practices, employer-led vaccination policies, and proof of vaccination requirements. The deliverables will serve as guidance for government agencies, private businesses, and public health officials as they determine which policies to implement to achieve an equitable and safe reopening.
Meet the Student Consulting Lab Team
AK Sterling
Erica Barnhart
Executive MPA Program Director
