Practicing Evaluation: A Collaborative Approach

"Rita grounds her collaborative work in the American Evaluation Association′s Guiding Principles, situates it within its Collaborative, Participatory, and Empowerment Evaluation Topical Interest Group, and discusses it within the confines of the evaluation literature. Sounds like sound evaluation to me."
―David Fetterman, Past-President, American Evaluation Association and Director of Evaluation, Stanford University 

When stakeholders collaborate with evaluators, their understanding increases and the utility of the evaluation is often enhanced. With over 20 years of evaluation experience, author Rita O′Sullivan has created an approach that actively engages program stakeholders in the evaluation process. Practicing Evaluation: A Collaborative Approach contains strategies and techniques for conducting successful collaborative evaluations in a variety of program settings, including education, family support, health, and non-profit organizations. 

Although many evaluation textbooks cover the theory and steps of an evaluation, they do not often include specifics regarding how to put these concepts into actual practice in a real-world setting, such as a school district or business. Using actual cases from educational, health, and business settings, O′Sullivan shows readers how to better involve stakeholders in the evaluation process. 

Key Features

* A chapter on to how to design program evaluations with a collaborative approach
* Checklists within the chapters and end-of-chapter exercises that give readers the opportunity to practice what they′ve learned
* Boxed examples that provide snapshots of other evaluations and highlight effective evaluation techniques and collaborative evaluation practices
* Excerpts from the two most widely cited sources covering professional ethical standards (the American Evaluation Association Guidelines for Professional Practice and the Joint Committee Standards for Educational Program Evaluation)

Rita G. OSullivan, who obtained her Ed.D. in 1984 from Auburn University, was the treasurer of the American Evaluation Association for ten years. She was a member of the education faculty at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro until she joined the faculty at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill after being recruited her to teach evaluation techniques to students in management, public and educational administration, and nursing.