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Issues in the Evaluation of Programmes for Indigenous Communities in Australia
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| Presenter(s):
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| Anne Markiewicz, Anne Markiewicz and Associates, anne@anneconsulting.com.au
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| Abstract:
This paper will consider some of the issues involved in the evaluation of programss established for Indigenous communities in Australia. The presenter received the 2008 award by the Australasian Evaluation Society for Excellence in Indigenous evaluation. This award recognised the complexities involved in undertaking evaluation in this context where the evaluator has to balance ethical approaches to evaluation, cultural sensitivity and provide an evaluation which is rigorous and credible to the program funder. The presentation will consider some of the challenges for the evaluator where the funder has unrealistic expectations of time frames for data collection, the kinds of data that can be collected and the ways in which the evaluation can be designed and implemented. The presentation will focus on some examples in evaluations completed in fields of family violence prevention, education and employment and crime and justice.
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Empowerment, Collaborative, and Participatory Evaluation: Too Apologetic
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| Presenter(s):
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| Morris Lai, University of Hawaii at Manoa, lai@hawaii.edu
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| Susan York, University of Hawaii at Manoa, yorks@hawaii.edu
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| Abstract:
The debate on the various forms of evaluation that involve the evaluator in programming (empowerment, collaborative, participatory, etc.) seems to challenge the rigor and objectivity of such processes. Such debate does not arise in Native Hawaiian (and other indigenous) communities: how could the community/program have faith in the evaluation if they did not have a relationship with the evaluator? Respect, trust, honor, responsibility-all are tied to the strength of the relationship. We do not apologize for being active partners in the project:
Terms like empowerment, participatory, and collaborative evaluation do not encompass the evaluator-program relationship concept as it is used when considering culturally appropriate evaluations in Native Hawaiian and/or indigenous communities.
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