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Session Title: Whom Does an Evaluation Serve? Aligning Divergent Evaluation Needs and Values
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Panel Session 826 to be held in Huntington C on Saturday, Nov 5, 8:00 AM to 9:30 AM
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Sponsored by the Government Evaluation TIG
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| Chair(s): |
| Dawn Smart, Clegg & Associates, dsmart@cleggassociates.com
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| Discussant(s):
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| George Grob, Center for Public Program Evaluation, georgefgrob@cs.com
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| Abstract:
Programs carrying out evaluations as a condition of government or foundation funding often struggle to balance the dictates of the grantmaker for data collection and reporting with the desire to make the evaluation beneficial internally. What is valuable to funders is sometimes inconsistent with what is useful for program improvement or other reporting, particularly when funders 'roll up' results across grantees. Or there may be competing requirements among evaluation sponsors or organizational stakeholders. And sometimes, a sponsor or funder has an internal conflict on how they want to use the evaluation. This panel will present perspectives of evaluators who work with organizations and at local, state, federal, tribal and international levels. Panelists will talk about their experiences managing the plurality of agendas, the challenges of balancing the priorities, and how they avoid getting caught between opposing groups. Session participants will discuss ways to ensure useful and honest evaluations for everyone.
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Responding to State Sponsors and Stakeholders When Their Values and Evaluation Needs may be at Odds
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| Rakesh Mohan, Idaho State Legislature, rmohan@ope.idaho.gov
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Credibility is the only thing that saves the day for evaluators working in a politically charged environment. But where does this credibility come from? How does one establish and maintain credibility? Can we be responsive to the values and evaluation needs of sponsors and stakeholders while maintaining our independence from them as evaluators? The presenter will share his experiences working in a highly politically-charged state legislative environment. He will use examples of evaluations done in the areas of K-12 public education and corrections to illustrate how evaluators can successfully navigate through difficult situations involving conflicting and competing values and needs.
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When an International Organization Gives Mixed Messages on the Purpose of the Evaluation
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| Tessie Catsambas, EnCompass LLC, tcatsambas@encompassworld.com
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The presenter worked on an evaluation of an online M&E system for HIV/AIDS for global use by countries. In this evaluation, the client, an international organization, kept giving distinctively different messages oscillating from "we want to kill the online program," "we want to build the online program," and "we want to stop building the online program but would like to continue supporting it." To make matters worse, the client asked the evaluation team to recommend whether the client should continue working on the program (essentially inviting the evaluation team to step right into the center of internal conflict). The presenter will share the strategies used to navigate this treacherous ground and how the evaluation findings were used to facilitate a compromise and resolution internally.
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Strategies to Reconcile Differing Needs and Values: Examples from Federal and Foundation Evaluation Projects
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| Dawn Smart, Clegg & Associates, dsmart@cleggassociates.com
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The presenter will share her experience with two evaluations, one a federally-funded technical assistance program and one a foundation-funded initiative for a tribal organization. In each case, reconciling the grantmaker's prescribed evaluation focus and reporting requirements with the interests of the organization was a challenge. In order to address the needs of the clients and their respective funders, and stay within budget, a number of strategies were put in place. They included adjusting initial evaluation plans, dropping some measures in favor of others, supplementing the data collection, and perhaps most successful and creative, collaborating with another evaluation underway. In both cases, the questions of purpose, value, and balancing agendas and priorities were squarely on the table.
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