Over the last decade, the idea of societal impact resulting from publicly funded research has changed from being a relatively fringe concern related to high-technology entrepreneurship and spin-off companies to becoming an increasingly important public policy concern. This has stimulated academic science policy research to investigate the impact…

Due to the diversity of steps to be followed in program evaluation and knowledge, skills, qualification and competency requirements, the evaluation should be a field of expertise similar to other disciplines. Thus, it is important to consider program evaluation as a field of expertise and to determine the required competencies. This study aimed to…

Many studies of education interventions make claims about impacts on students' outcomes. Some studies have designs that enable readers to make causal inferences about the effects of an intervention but others have designs that do not permit these types of conclusions. To help policymakers, practitioners, and others make sense of study results, the…

Over the past decade, researchers, policy makers, and practitioners have increasingly come to recognize the importance of quality in early care and education. Along with this recognition is compelling evidence that sound administrative practices help ensure high-quality learning opportunities for young children. Since its first publication in…

The What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) evaluates research studies that look at the effectiveness of education programs, products, practices, and policies, which the WWC calls "interventions." Many studies of education interventions make claims about impacts on students' outcomes. Some studies have designs that enable readers to make causal…

The foster youth education program strives to increase graduation rates by improving academic performance and encouraging student retention through an innovative collaboration between tutors, social workers, and schools to provide individualized support. The pilot program was funded by U.S. Department of Education Innovation Funds, which evolving…

The term "outcome evaluation" has become one of the most popular terms among human service providers and those whose job it is to evaluate the impact of human service programs. In the public sector alone, there are over a hundred instruments in use to evaluate the impact of state human service programs. Most states, many providers, and…

Professionals in various fields have the opportunity to train in real-life situations before they take on a job by themselves. In program evaluation, however, preservice training usually focuses on coursework oriented to research design and methods. After completing these studies, evaluators go off to conduct evaluations guided primarily by their…

The applied dissertation project focused on the development of a comprehensive onboarding program and Trainer's Guide specifically developed for charter school management employees. Charter school education has grown significantly in the last several decades with over 6,100 charter schools that are currently serving students nationwide. Formal or…

Joseph S. Wholey is Professor Emeritus in the University of Southern California's (USC) School of Public Policy, Planning, and Development. He received his BA from Catholic University, Phi Beta Kappa and his MA in mathematics and PhD in philosophy from Harvard University. His work focuses on the use of strategic planning, performance measurement,…

States and districts can use this tool to create their own plans for continual improvement of an observation system, no matter where they are in their implementation. Included are action steps to improve observation rubrics, observer training, observer assessment, and monitoring. A planning process is described to assess current status, determine…

Nearly all private, government and non-governmental organizations that receive government funding to run social or health promotion programs in the United States are required to conduct program evaluations and to report findings to the funding agency. Reports are usually due at the end of a funding cycle and they may or may not have an influence…

Mathematics Recovery (MR) is designed to identify first graders who are struggling in mathematics and provide them with intensive one-to-one tutoring. We report findings from a 2-year evaluation of MR conducted in 20 elementary schools across five districts in two states. The design allowed for the estimation of the counterfactual growth…

Background: Since the late 1970s participatory approaches have been widely promoted to evaluate international development programs. However, there is no universal agreement of what is meant by participatory evaluation. For some evaluators, participatory evaluations involve the extensive participation of all stakeholder groups (from donor to…

This article describes an evaluation that was judged to be unsuccessful from the point of view of key program stakeholders. This was due to the fact that the evaluation did not support program advocates who had much to gain from positive evaluation findings. We argue that, although the knowledge needs of stakeholders must be taken into account,…