Atlantic Philanthropies' investments on behalf of people with disabilities living in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland were instrumental in advancing the rights of the disabled and fostering community inclusion and participation, an evaluation commissioned by the foundation finds. The report, Making a Difference in the Lives of People with Disabilities: Capturing the Learning From Funding on the Island of Ireland (20 pages, PDF), found that Atlantic's grantees helped to improve access to justice and services for people with disabilities by, among other things, providing guidance for the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; securing legislative gains for people with disabilities; and directing European Union funds toward community-based care. Conducted by Morrow Gilchrist Associates, the evaluation also found that Atlantic's grantmaking successfully seeded innovative models of person-centered support and service delivery, helped build participative human rights-based models, and improved the social sector's capacity to advance policy reform. Lessons learned from the foundation's efforts include the difficulty of translating policy recommendations into an actual reallocation of resources; the value of building capacity and networks across a field; and the importance of investing the time and resources needed to realize substantive policy change.