Legislative program evaluation (LPE) allows legislatures to ensure that the programs they establish or fund are operating efficiently, effectively, and economically. Unlike evaluations that have knowledge development as their primary purposes, LPE is utilization-driven because its customer-the legislature-demands useful, timely knowledge "in plain English." LPE's focus on utilization creates some unique conditions, methods, processes, and products that add overall value to the field of program evaluation.
The Fourth Edition of the bestselling Utilization-Focused Evaluation provides expert, detailed advice on conducting program evaluations from one of leading experts. Chock full of useful pedagogy—including a unique utilization-focused evaluation checklist—this book presents Michael Quinn Patton′s distinctive opinions based on more than thirty years of experience. Key Features of the Fourth Edition Provides thoroughly updated materials including more international content; new references; new exhibits and sidebars; and new examples, stories, and cartoons Includes follow-up exercises at the end of each chapter Features a utilization-focused evaluation checklist Gives greater emphasis on mixed methods Analyzes the pluses and minuses of the increased emphasis on accountability and performance measurement in government at all levels Details the explosion of international evaluation Intended Audience Both theoretical and practical, this core text is an essential resource for students enrolled in Program Evaluation courses in a variety of disciplines—including public administration, government, social sciences, education, and management. Practitioners will also find this text invaluable.
Public policymaking is a high-stakes business that affects millions of citizens and budgets ranging in the billions of tax dollars in even the smallest of states. Policymakers need timely evaluative information reported in understandable language by unbiased sources. It is this need that evaluators at all levels of government, as well as those in many nonprofit organizations, seek to meet as they conduct evaluations, analyze policy options, and recommend action on the part of policymakers. The authors contributing to this volume examine theoretical and practical approaches to designing evaluation projects in ways that promote the use of evaluation results in high-stakes settings. The volume explores management of the politics of evaluation, which can be accomplished by considering the context in which an evaluation occurs and examining strategies for maximizing both evaluators' independence from and their responsiveness to key stakeholders. Unconventional approaches, such as prospective evaluation and development of analytical tools for use by agency personnel, are examined, as is promotion of evaluation use through a symbiotic relationship with performance measurement. The chapter authors discuss utilization strategies as applied to evaluations of public health, education, and corrections programs. The final chapter provides sage advice to evaluators on how to impact policy development.
Integrate qualitative inquiry approaches and methods into the practice of evaluation Qualitative inquiry can have a major effect on evaluation practice, and provides evaluators a means to explore and examine various settings and contexts in need of rich description and deeper understanding. Qualitative Inquiry in Evaluation: From Theory to Practice explores the most important considerations for both students and evaluation professionals. Using various evaluation theories and approaches as a springboard for real-world practice, this reference serves as an accessible text for beginning students and seasoned professionals alike. Readers are given an in-depth view of the key qualities and benefits of qualitative inquiry, which also serves as a crucial counterpart to quantitative analysis. Chapters in part one focus on the foundations, core concepts, and intersection of evaluation theory and qualitative inquiry. Part two contains contributions from leading evaluators whose design, implementation, and reporting strategies for qualitative inquiry are centered on common, real-world settings. These case-based chapters point to the strengths and challenges of implementing qualitative evaluations. Key competencies for conducting effective qualitative evaluations are also discussed. Explores the role of qualitative inquiry in many prominent approaches to evaluation Discusses the method's history and delves into key concepts in qualitative inquiry and evaluation Helps readers understand which qualities are necessary to be an effective qualitative evaluator Presents the viewpoints and experiences of expert editors and contributing authors with high levels of understanding on the topic Qualitative Inquiry in Evaluation: From Theory to Practice is a vital tool for evaluators and students alike who are looking to deepen their understanding of the theoretical perspectives and practice considerations of qualitative evaluation.
Solving complex evaluation environments with competing stakeholder needs Responding to Sponsors and Stakeholders in Complex Evaluation Environments: New Directions for Evaluation, Number 95 provides in-depth guidance on answering the question: "For whom are we doing this evaluation, anyway?". The answer may be more complex that it appears, and right and wrong answers may actually overlap. This book identifies the challenges of complex evaluation environments, and shows you how to meet the multiple — often competing — needs of everyone involved. From difficulties in context and authorization to initiatives and legislation, this book provides insight every evaluation organization needs.
This volume presents the Talent Development evaluation framework, an approach for evaluating urban school reform interventions deeply embedded in the work of the Howard University Center for Research on the Education of Students Placed At Risk (CRESPAR) and the Talent Development Model of School Reform. The CRESPAR Talent Development (TD) evaluation approach is rooted in several traditions of evaluation that intentionally seek engagement with contexts of practice. These traditions include responsive, participatory, empowerment, and culturally competent approaches to evaluation. The CRESPAR TD evaluation approach also takes up themes of inclusiveness and partnership advanced by the recent promotion of multiple methods in evaluation. With these themes, the TD evaluation approach is viably grounded in well-accepted evaluation concepts and principles. The approach further seeks to be practical, useful, formative, and empowering for the many individuals served by TD evaluations and to give “voice” to persons whose perspectives are often ignored, minimized, or rejected in urban school settings. Beyond such grounding and ambitions, the CRESPAR TD evaluation framework seeks to re-position evaluation in low-income urban contexts as accountable, not only for producing accurate and relevant information on the program being evaluated, but also for enabling and contributing to the program’s social betterment and social justice intentions. This re-positioning is effected primarily by a collaborative, co-constructionist model for evaluation in which CRESPAR program developers, implementers, and evaluators – along with key program stakeholders – partner together in envisioning, implementing, and evaluating programs that are responsive to and make cultural sense in the context at hand. CRESPAR TD evaluators are contextually and culturally engaged and are responsible for this engagement. This volume highlights the approach’s five major themes: engaging stakeholders, co-construction, responsiveness, cultural and contextual relevance, and triangulation of perspectives.
Exploring research's impact on evaluation practice The Practice-Theory Relationship in Evaluation: New Directions for Evaluation presents the finding of a unique empirical study of evaluation, comparing the reported practices of evaluation theorists with real-world practices in the field. A selection of leading authorities offer both analyses and perspectives on the study's impact on the field, prompting deep consideration of the role of empirical study of evaluation and the relationship between concept and practice. Empirical study of evaluation is key to improving practices and developing alternate approaches, and this book stimulates the level of debate necessary for determining future directions.
This issue explores the current state of program theory as it has developed over the last ten years and examines the role program theory can play in a range of new areas that have recently arisen in evaluation. The contributors draw on a review of the literature to discuss the history of program evaluation, its diversity in application, and its strength and limitations in practice, including the special challenges related to causal inference. They describe opportunities for program theory to help evaluators in areas such as measuring performance, replicating successful programs, helping program staff understand the support evaluation, and conducting meta-analysis. They outline a future agenda for program theory evaluation, explain why it is essential that there be an increase in real-world tests and applications, and more. This is the 87th issue of the quarterly journal New Directions for Evaluation.
This volume examines the problem of null or negative evaluation findings, a topic rarely discussed in the literature but all too commonplace in the experience of evaluators. The Southern California Center of Excellence on Youth Violence Prevention, housed in the Robert Presley Center for Crime and Justice Studies at the University of California, Riverside, has taken up the challenge to discuss candidly evaluation efforts that can be described only as challenging. The individual chapters discuss a range of design, implementation, and analysis issues relevant not only to evaluation studies but also to interventions that can contribute to negative or null findings in the evaluation of an intervention program. These problems that are the realities of life for anyone who conducts prevention and intervention research are typically the stuff of research seminar comments and barroom digressions late in the evening at professional meetings. This issue brings those important lessons into the larger discussion that will influence prevention science and public policy. The contributors to this volume not only admit a set of problems and shortcomings but also attempt to draw general lessons, cautions, and advice for those who evaluate prevention and intervention efforts. This is the 110th volume of New Directions for Evaluation, a quarterly journal published by Jossey-Bass.
