The indicators measured and data yielded by the survey are “status” indicators of child and youth well-being. That is, they tell us about the states, experiences and perspectives of young people. As much as possible, the survey data are “outcome” focused: influenced by many conditions in the ecosystem around young people, including within and across their families, communities, societies and environments. Even measured at the community level, many of these data are influenced by policy paradigms, policy decisions and other conditions at the national or even global levels. For instance, the overall level of income inequality in a country has been found to have a profound effect on many aspects of child and youth well-being, including levels of obesity and bullying. Young people’s own choices also shape these outcomes. The survey indicators are not intended to measure these inputs to and influences on young people’s outcomes, though some outcomes do influence others (e.g., food security influences school experiences, including bullying). Measuring inputs and influences is possible, but it involves many complex relationships and value judgments that, in the case of the Community Child and Youth Well-being Survey, are better identified through data interpretation or sense-making activities. These activities can also explore the interconnections between the outcome data. 

Survey data are the start of a process to deepen understanding of children’s lives, not the end point. Once the data are available, familiarizing as many people as possible with the data is the next key objective. Nobody needs to be a statistician to use the survey findings. At a minimum, introduce the findings in an understandable form to specific groups who have expressed interest in working with the data and engage or encourage them to undertake sense-making exercises with young people and within their own organizations. 

The gold standard of sense-making work brings together people representing as much diversity of experience and perspective as possible in a mixed forum. Going back to the illustration at the beginning of this toolkit, we are reminded that working across differences toward a shared goal is often the surest way to seed innovation and progress. Some of the specific groups you may want to target at this stage include decision-makers – those who decide budgets, policies and services affecting children and youth, including many sectors of government (elected and administrative) – business leaders, foundations and community organizations and associations. Bringing them together with researchers, youth-oriented advocacy groups and young people in sense-making activities can set you up for success at the next stage: acting on the data.

Sense-making is as much about figuring out what questions to ask as it is finding answers. The data reporting you did in the previous step should give you a place to start asking questions. For instance, the data may reveal areas of life where many young people are experiencing “extremes” (e.g., very high or low life satisfaction), where there are larger and smaller gaps between groups of young people, where there is more or less progress over time, and where the community is reporting better or worse outcomes than other communities or the national average. Sense-making processes could start with these questions: 

• What stands out to you?
• What patterns are we seeing? 
• How much variation is there in the indicator data (e.g., are the scores close together? What is the range?)? Are the differences important?
• Are the results consistent with what we already know? What is surprising?
• What questions do the data raise that engaging with young people can help us understand? 
• What might be causing these outcomes and patterns? 
• What will you do now?

Resist the urge to work on solutions during this step, and take care not to reach cause and effect conclusions unless the data supports that.

There are a number of ways to facilitate this kind of interaction, from simple and quick to more detailed and process-oriented. Regardless of what you have the time and resources to do, be clear about your goal and what you want people to know about or do with the data.

1. Create a social media dialogue and consider a social media event, such as an Instagram takeover, Facebook Live or Twitter Spaces. A social media dialogue can also occur alongside the kinds of convenings outlined below.
2. Create and promote an online space (such as a wiki) to hold conversations and share insights and questions about the data from various groups and individuals.
3. Host one or a series of invitation-only sense-making events (which can be hybrid, virtual or face-to-face). Controlling the invitation list allows you to optimize diversity; for example, you could have government officials and social innovation leaders working alongside young people, business owners, parents and academics in a safe space. Experienced facilitators can plan a productive agenda with young people and keep the schedule on track. 
4. Create and distribute an activity or discussion guide for young people, teachers and youth organizations to use within classrooms or youth group gatherings. Be sure to capture and share the outcomes with the larger stakeholder group as much as possible.
5. Sponsor a hack-a-thon competition for computer programmers and/or statisticians. Provide them with the data in advance and reward those teams that find the most interesting correlations within the data (e.g., boys who feel supported at home are most likely to be involved in extracurricular activities).

See the survey Youth Data Party Kit on the survey web portal for more detailed ideas to work with young people in sense-making and action-planning.