How to Assess Program Implementation

This volume -- the revised edition of How to Measure Program Implementation -- covers the assessment of how a program design works in practice. It reflects the recent emphasis on qualitative methods, and discusses when qualitative or quantitative methods are more appropriate. The book illustrates that the evaluator′s task is not to judge the adequacy of program implementation, but rather to document, describe, observe, or assess by some other means how a program is implemented. The text has been organized to reflect a natural and logical ordering of the steps of planning, data collection, and analysis. References have been updated and examples included from education, business, social services, and other non-profit settings.

Extensively revised to reflect modern views of program implementation, this volume introduces the variety of functions served by implementation studies and the roles played by qualitative and quantitative data. The reader is shown the importance of assessing how a program design works in actual practice--and is given the planning tools and procedures to make assessment happen. The evaluator′s role in documenting, describing, observing and assessing how a program is implemented is covered in detail. Step-by-step guidelines are provided for identifying key program processes and arrangements for assessment, for selecting optimal strategies for conducting the assessment, and for developing and analyzing questionnaires, interviews, observations, and program records.