Building Evaluation Capacity: 72 Activities for Teaching and Training

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"Evaluative thinking is an acquired competence, not at all natural. This book offers the best and most comprehensive materials and exercises available for evaluation teaching and training.  Students need practice to develop evaluation skills. These exercises provide opportunities to practice. Stakeholders need to learn to think evaluatively to participate meaningfully in evaluations. Every evaluation is therefore also a teaching opportunity and these materials facilitate the essential understandings needed to engage stakeholders. At the essence of all 72 activities presented by Preskill and Russ-Eft, from understanding different types of evaluation to making methods choices and analyzing data, is the challenge of thinking evaluatively. This book is a tremendous contribution to the profession."
―Michael Quinn Patton, author of Utilization-Focused Evaluation and Qualitative Research & Evaluation Methods

"This book is an excellent resource for classroom and field instruction as well as professional development."
―Katherine Ryan, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

"Finally, here is a book that goes beyond the theory of evaluation, or the question of what evaluation entails. Instead, it provides hundreds of practical approaches to actually do it. Beyond being all you wanted to know but were afraid to ask, this answers questions most of us have never thought about. It is a remarkable gift to our profession."
―John H. Zenger, Managing Partner of Extraordinary Performance Group and CEO of Provant, Inc.

Building Evaluation Capacity provides 72 activities for learning how to design and conduct evaluation studies. These activities address the entire evaluation process, including:

• An understanding of what evaluation is
• The politics and ethics of evaluation
• The influence of culture on evaluation
• Various evaluation models, approaches, and designs
• Data collection and analysis methods
• Communicating and reporting progress and findings
• Building and sustaining support for evaluation

Each activity includes an overview, instructional objectives, time estimates, materials needed, handouts, and procedures for effectively using the activity, whether there are a few participants or an unlimited number in small groups. To help the reader locate specific kinds of activities, the book includes a chart that names the activity, the time needed to implement the activity, and whether background information or knowledge is required prior to implementing the activity. The book also includes several strategies for forming groups and a glossary of instructional strategies.

This book is ideal as a text for evaluation courses throughout the social sciences. Students, instructors, trainers, consultants, and managers will all find countless ideas and strategies that facilitate learning.

Hallie Preskill, PhD. is a Managing Director with FSG, a global nonprofit strategy, evaluation, and research consulting firm (since 2009), and leads the firm’s Strategic Learning and Evaluation practice. In her role as a senior advisor, she works on a wide variety of evaluation and learning projects. Sample clients include the Kresge Foundation, MasterCard Foundation, Knight Foundation, The California Endowment, Missouri Foundation for Health, Norlien Foundation, Packard Foundation, Northwest Area Foundation, Blue Shield of CA Foundation, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. She has helped evaluate a wide range of initiatives and programs related to community information needs, substance abuse, early learning, poverty, arts and culture, teacher professional development, domestic and sexual violence, economic development, youth and education, and healthcare. 

Prior to joining FSG, Hallie spent more than 20 years in academia, teaching graduate level courses in program evaluation, training design and development, organizational learning, appreciative inquiry and consulting. Her research has focused on evaluation capacity building, transfer of learning/training, evaluation use, and evaluation as a catalyst for individual, team, and organizational learning. Hallie’s other books include: Reframing Evaluation through Appreciative Inquiry (2006, with T. Catsambas), Evaluation in Organizations: A Systematic Approach to Enhancing Learning, Performance & Change (2001, 2009, with D. Russ-Eft), Evaluation Strategies for Effective Strategies for Communicating and Reporting (2005, with R. T. Torres and M. Piontek), and Evaluative Inquiry for Learning in Organizations (1999, with R. T. Torres), and Becoming the Change: What One Organization Working To Transform Educational Systems Learned About Team Learning and Change (2011, with R. Babiera).

Hallie was the 2007 President of the American Evaluation Association. She received the American Evaluation Association′s Alva and Gunnar Myrdal Award for Outstanding Professional Practice in 2002 and the University of Illinois Distinguished Alumni Award in 2004. Hallie holds a PhD from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Darlene Russ-Eft, Ph.D., is Professor Emeritus of Adult and Higher Education, College of  Education, Oregon State University (OSU).  She received her BA from the College of Wooster in psychology and her MA and PhD from University of Michigan in cognitive psychology.  She worked for international training companies as director of research before joining OSU, where she teaches doctoral and master’s courses to senior leaders and practitioners.  Her research focuses on issues related to leadership development and HRD program evaluation.  Her most recent book is titled Managing Social Science Research (2017, Wiley).  She is past president of the Academy of Human Resource Development (AHRD); past board member of the American Evaluation Association; and past editor of Human Resource Development Quarterly.  In her previous role with international training companies and as a director for the International Board of Standards for Training, Performance, and Instruction (ibstpi^R), she has undertaken several studies examining global competencies related to HRD.  She has received several awards for her research, including the Times Mirror Editor of the Year Award, the ASTD (now ATD) Research Article Award, and the AHRD Scholar Award.  She was also inducted into the AHRD Hall of Fame.