Program Evaluation : An Essential Tool For Value Check

Hypertension (HTN) is a chronic illness that serves as a main risk factor for cardiovascular disease (Hanus, Simoes, Amboni, Ceretta, & Tuon, 2015). Although medication can manage HTN appropriately, lifestyle modifications make a substantial difference as well. However, many patients go through behavior stages in which he or she contemplate on making the necessary changes to improve their health. One solution to the problem is the development of an educational Hypertension Intervention and Follow-Up program (HIFP). Studies have shown that active educational interventions that incorporate small groups are more effective than passive delivery of educational materials (Pimenta, Caldiera, & Mamede,

3. The third key point that I took away from the evaluation was the importance of developing a performance evaluation system. The evaluation system is a key component that assists to “assess both short-term and long-term outcomes for participants in the program, including educational and social outcomes” (Bania et al., 2014, p. 5). I learned that when the system is implemented effectively, it ensures accountability and promotes growth.

Various researchers have focused on simply just evaluating the impact these programs have on its participants and if they have been implemented as planned by the relevant stakeholders. For example, the purpose of Esbesen and Osgood (1999) national evaluation of the GREAT program is to compare between students who participated in the intervention to those who did not take part in the 13 lessons offered by GREAT. Additionally, Reddy and Goldstein (2001) conduct a program evaluation on the program ART, but their sample is only made up by sixty adolescent males and cannot be generalizable to the United States

Purpose of the evaluation: What aspect of the program would you assess? How does this complement the larger group evaluation? (5 points)

Furthermore, the criteria for determining a program’s success or failure is objectivity identity with well-established assessments which accesses student’s literacy skills according to personal literacy skills and their progress in using them (Bell,

Program evaluation is a system that determines a program’s effectiveness and efficiency. This means whatever the programs expectations are must be kept. Efficiency is measured by the outcomes that are achieved with effort, limited time and additional resources. Excellent program evaluation includes subjective or objective information based on many different options. Human Services programs are important to evaluate for numerous reasons. The program can save time by finding out what works or doesn’t work for them. Making the community more aware of the program and how it benefits participants. The ability to prove the program’s effectiveness can help raise additional funding. The staff of the agency will be able to identify strengths and weakness. Also, bring more awareness to the Human Services field by educating other programs how to get started.

According to Mertens and Wilson, program evaluation is a systematic method for collecting, analyzing, and using information to answer questions about projects, policies and programs, particularly about their effectiveness and efficiency. Stakeholders often want to know whether the programs they are funding and supporting are effective. While program evaluation first focuses on the effectiveness of the program, other important factors to take into consideration is cost of the program, improvements that could be made, outcomes of the program, and usefulness of the program. Evaluators help to answer these questions, and stakeholders have to work with the evaluators in order to come to the best conclusion about the effectiveness of a program so that all aspects are taken into consideration. Program evaluations can involve both quantitative and qualitative methods of research. People who do program evaluation come from many different backgrounds, such as sociology, psychology, economics, social work, and public policy. Some graduate schools also have specific training programs for program evaluation.

Evaluation of the program should be ongoing, in the best effort to target issues within the program as efficiently as possible. Evaluation should be built into the program, making it effortless for those involved to provide the necessary information to create useful evaluations. Additionally, any evaluation should be cost effective, so as to not hinder the program as a whole. Any evaluations must also be done ethically and conducted competently. It is also important to disseminate the results of evaluations to interested and appropriate audiences.

Conducting program evaluations help us to find the best possible way for our program to be successful and offer a high quality program.

The evaluation of a program can be simple and informal or complex and very formal or a combination of the two. For every program designer or manager there are benefits to program evaluation and a necessity to evaluate the program. Program evaluation tells you whether the time and effort spent in and on the program is worth it ("Why Program Evaluation is Important | National Center for Women & Information Technology," n.d.). This is a look into what program evaluation is, why a program should be evaluated, the different models of evaluation, and an in-depth look at one specific model – The Goal Free Model.

Another model of evaluation based on the personal observations makes the use of intensive personal observations and conversations with the stakeholders would be the proponents of “qualitative or naturalistic” argues that only a deep and thorough understanding of a program will permit the most helpful with the evaluation. Offering the “expert opinion model” where the evaluator must be the data-gathering instrument; yet, a greater emphasis is placed on the understanding the experiences to such issues.

I enjoyed reading your post. As we have learned during this discussion board through our classmates, there are a plethora of different ways that can be used to evaluate programs. You gave numerous examples as to why program evaluations are important in early childhood education and why they are conducted in the first place. Another reason that program evaluations are conducted are to see if the program is working (Gilliam & Leiter, 2003). For instance, the Head Start Program at my school constantly makes changes to their program due to their yearly evaluation. If they see that something is not working, the head of the program tries to come up with different ways to change what is not working to try and make the program better for the students.

Program evaluation is an important tool to show that the health interventions have been effective and they also intend to improve the health of the target population. Evaluation helps define the worth of a program. It is imperative to conduct program evaluation in order to provide feedback to improve the effectiveness of the program. Evaluation plans should be developed at the beginning of the health program interventions. The CDC framework for program evaluation is comprised of the following steps:1) Engage stakeholders; 2) Describe the program; 3) Focus on evaluation design; 4) Gather credible evidence; 5) Justify conclusions; 6) Ensure use and share lessons learned. Also listed are the four standards for assessing the quality of evaluation activities: utility, feasibility, propriety, and accuracy (CDC, 2013). According to an article

1) After several workouts, I noticed a big in improvement in my cardiovascular capacity. I was able to do more laps within the 30 minutes. I also noticed that my body adapted to water to the fact that I had to swim more often, therefore I was less tired at the end of my workouts compared to the first time I did the workout. Additionally, I improved my swimming skills because it had been a while I did not swim, so I had to practice some movements and it helped me a lot to complete my laps faster.

This research analysis is meant to measure the effects of this particular program against the goals it set out to accomplish as a means of contributing to subsequent decision making about the program and improving future programming. This applied research study is an evaluation research project of social science that is intended to supply scientifically valid information with which to guide public policy. The goals of this evaluation research are to provide feedback to policy makers in concrete and measurable terms.