What are the principles of good evaluation?
Although evaluation is generally more effective when built in from the beginning, evaluations can also be retroactively applied to existing or completed initiatives. Ideally evaluation is an ongoing process that helps understand how the intervention is working, what effect it is having, and how it is influenced by internal and external factors.
A good evaluation should adhere to these key principles:
An example of good evaluation practice is to design your evaluation with project/program stakeholders.
Determining the evaluation design in collaboration with stakeholders supports transparency around expectations of the evaluation and the boundaries of what the evaluation will and will not deliver on. A clear evaluation design and scope ensures the right information is collected, analysed and reported such that the stakeholders can use and act on the information.
At the low quality end of the spectrum of evaluation rigour there is danger to evaluation becoming marketing or promotional material. The more your evaluation methods are rigorous and defensible the more likely it is to be perceived as quality evaluation. The more unclear your evaluation methods, questions and data are, the less evaluation-like it is and the more anecdotal, opinion and interest-centred it becomes.
At the low quality end of the evaluation spectrum acts such as;
- Drawing conclusions based on intuition is not high quality evaluation;
- Personal opinion, speculation or conjecture is not high quality evaluation; and/or
- Reporting the positive findings whilst refusing, altering or burying other findings is not high quality evaluation;
Additional resources
Transforming Access and Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO) - Our approach to evaluation