Qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) is gaining ground in evaluation circles, but the number of applications is still limited. In this article, we consider the challenges that can emerge during a QCA evaluation by drawing on our experience of conducting one in the field of development cooperation. For each stage of the evaluation process, we…

Governments, organizations, and companies are generating copious amounts of data and analysis to support education decision-making around the world. While continued investments in data creation and management are necessary, the ultimate value of information is not in its "production," but its "use." Herein lies one of the…

Rigorous evidence from around the world has shown that significant improvements in learning can be obtained at comparatively low cost by spending more, focused time ensuring that the bottom half of the class in the early grades does not get left behind. The authors present results from the Teacher Community Assistant Initiative (TCAI) that tests…

Background: For more than 30 years since 1972, the Government of Japan has contributed funds to UNESCO for implementation of the Mobile Training Team (MTT) projects. The MTT assists Member States enhance their capacity in development oriented educational innovation through intra-country study visits, training courses, workshops and technical…

Identifying the growing interest in early childhood programs and services, this paper offers practical guidelines for collecting accurate and useful information about early childhood services in a particular country or region, focusing on data collection and system monitoring. The paper discusses how programs develop out of policy decisions and…

This booklet is one of five in the Peace Corps (PC) Programming and Training Guidelines collection that provides agency-wide programming and training guidance for PC staff and project partners. It offers PC staff and others a step-by-step approach for designing or revising a project, beginning with analyzing the situation in a country and ending…

This booklet is one of five in the Peace Corps (PC) Programming and Training Guidelines collection that provides agency-wide programming and training guidance for PC staff and project partners. It shows how to design and implement a monitoring and evaluation (M&E) plan for PC projects. Chapter 1 provides an overview of M&E, including what…

The objectives of the state-of-the-art paper, second in a series on farming systems research (FSR) in the Third World, are to: (1) review the literature on farming systems; (2) evaluate farming systems research in international institutes and in national agricultural research systems in the Third World; and (3) recommend what can be done to…

In this manual, an attempt is made to demonstrate how certain social science measurements can be adapted to help field workers in economic and community development assess initial conditions before a project is begun, to measure the extent to which various attempts at producing social change have succeeded, to determine the overall result of…

The four 1991 issues of the newsletter "Development Communication Report" are primarily concerned with the use of communication technologies in developing countries to educate the people. Evaluation is the theme of the first issue, which contains the following articles: "Evaluating Communication Programs: Means and Ends,""Making a Splash: How…

A manual for trainers of development workers and change agents in the third world provides guidelines for evaluation of development training programs. Chapters define evaluation, present a general model of development, and discuss evaluation in development training programs. Designing training systems for development workers and change agents,…

The basic criteria for evaluating a nursing education program involve: the relevance of its goals, activities, and outcomes to the needs of the country or the community; the relatedness of its different parts in seeking and achieving common goals; and its accountability in assuming responsibility for its goals, methods, and outcome. The proposed…

A four-section annotated bibliography is comprised of sources for information on evaluation intended for non-formal education (NFE) participants. Several themes and issues stand out in the documents cited: (1) the difficulty of isolating impacts and attributing them to a specific educational project; (2) the question of qualitative (focussing on…

This manual is intended to assist volunteers and staff of volunteer organizations in the design of projects in various community and social service areas. The first section of the manual is a guidebook that addresses such aspects of the planning, implementation, and evaluation process as situational analysis, needs assessment, task-oriented…