Evaluation in Today’s World. Veronica G. Thomas
Tinsley, Guilford College
Kasahun Woldemariam, Spelman College
Wenfan Yan, University of Massachusetts Boston
We both are so very grateful to the many evaluation colleagues, stakeholders, and users, far too numerous to name, who have enriched our thinking and practice, particularly as they relate to cultural competence, social justice, diversity, and inclusion.
I (Veronica) want to thank the (current and former) faculty members, graduate students, and administrators at Howard University who inspired and assisted me in multiple ways, including Peggy C. Carr, Constance Ellison, Lawrence Gary, Brooke McKie, Faun Rockcliffe, Diana Edwards, Kimberly Edelin Freeman, and Dawn Williams. A special thanks to Jennifer C. Greene (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign) and Valerie Caracelli (U.S. Government Accountability Office) for their wisdom and for supporting my scholarship and encouraging me to take it to the next level. I thank my family for their support every day, every month of every year. And last, but certainly not least, I wish to extend my heartfelt thanks to Alvin E. Courtney Jr. for his love, motivation, inspiration, and relentless pursuit of excellence.
I (Pat) don’t even know where to begin to thank people for their inspiration and support. I am so fearful that I will miss folks. Toni, Eric, Melvin, Lois-ellin, and Lynn and Kathryn, Mort, Pamela, Ann, Seth, Jesse, and—adhering to a tradition started many years ago, in my dissertation—Tonya and Houdini the cats, thank you. And at the beginning and the end, as always, there is Tom. Thank you, my love.
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Evaluation’s ultimate goal is to provide credible evidence that fosters greater understanding and improves decision making, all aimed at improving social conditions and promoting healthy, just, and equitable communities.
Chapter 1 Evaluations of Future: Inclusive, Equity-Focused, Useful, and Used
Over the past 20 years, there has been a large increase in the number of evaluations conducted and utilized. During the same time period, there has been an emphasis on the professionalization of evaluation and evaluators and on the skills and knowledge evaluators need to be effective. In today’s world, along with having more traditional evaluation skills and knowledge, evaluators need to understand how to implement high-quality evaluations within different cultural contexts in a world that is increasingly distrustful of data and facts. The goal of this book is to provide readers with this knowledge and those skills.
After reading this chapter and participating in the activities, readers will be able to meet the following learning objectives:
Describe the book’s goals and the authors’ philosophy underlying the book
Have a general knowledge of the content to be covered in the book
Describe what a racialized and social justice perspective is
Explain the meaning and importance of cultural competence and responsiveness in terms of evaluation
Explain ways that bias and perceptions of objectivity can skew evaluations
List some challenges of doing evaluation in today’s world
Introduction
This chapter provides an overview of the book, its goals, and its underlying philosophy. It includes an introduction to the content, the major cross-chapter themes, and the framework of the book. In addition, it introduces the concept of cultural competence, which is the ability to understand, communicate with, and effectively interact with people across cultures (Make It Our Business, 2017), and cultural responsiveness, which is the application of the abilities described in the definition of cultural competence. Along with covering issues of objectivity and bias, the chapter discusses the declining trust in science and data, the rise of fake news and alternative facts, and how this can impact evaluators and evaluation. Fake news has been defined as “false new[s] stories, often spread as propaganda on social media. It can also characterize any information that one finds critical about [oneself]” (Dicitionary.com, 2020b, para. 1) while alternative facts are the “opposite of reality (which is delusion), or the opposite of truth (which is untruth)” (Dicitionary.com, 2020a, para. 1).
It is expected that after completing this chapter and the activities, the reader will have an overview of the content covered in the book and know its goals and the general themes that cut across chapters, including the influence of a racialized and social justice perspective on the book. Having a racialized perspective “means paying attention, even when uncomfortable, to the ways in which race shapes problem definition and solution as well as particular group’s access to opportunity” (Thomas, Madison, Rockcliffe, DeLaine, & Lowe, 2018, p. 521).
An Overview of the Book
The focus of this book is to help students and other readers understand both the art and the science of evaluation. It covers theoretical and practical issues related to evaluation of programs, particularly social programs and projects, with an emphasis on viewing evaluation topics through a social justice, diversity, and inclusive perspective. The book provides an approach for evaluators to aim toward being reflective practitioners and culturally competent professionals.
Structure of the Book
Each chapter begins with a series of learning objectives, or “brief statements that describe what students will be expected to learn” (Great Schools Partnership, 2014, para. 1 [), and ends with a summary of the chapter. Numerous examples and activities are included for the purpose of illustrating how the information in the book can be applied in actual settings. Within each chapter is commentary from practicing evaluators and evaluation users, called Voices From the Field. Also included is an annotated list of supplemental resources and/or tools for those who would like to delve more deeply into the areas covered. As can be seen in this chapter, evaluation-related terms are bolded the first time they are defined, and at the end of the book is a glossary of the bolded terms. The book as a whole and the individual chapters cover how race and social justice issues affect different aspects of evaluation and how readers can use that knowledge to improve evaluation quality and usefulness.
Chapter Content
The book is composed of 16 chapters. This, the first chapter, provides an overview of the book and its underlying premises. Chapter 2, “Evaluation Ethics and Quality Standards,” covers ethical and quality standards for the profession. Building on the American Evaluation Association’s (AEA) Evaluators’ Ethical Guiding Principles, the chapter covers various types of potential ethical dilemmas, including the ethical dimensions of bias. It challenges readers to provide their own solutions to these dilemmas, along with a rationale, and helps readers understand what is and isn’t an ethical and quality evaluation, taking into consideration not only culture and context but also the AEA’s Evaluators’ Ethical Guiding Principles and the Program Evaluation Standards compiled by the Joint Committee on Standards for Educational Evaluation.
Chapter 3, “Historical Evolution of Program Evaluation Through a Social Justice Lens,” covers key events and developments in evaluation practice including the professionalization of evaluation, fundamental and recurring issues in the field, and technological advances. It goes on to discuss emerging trends and key scholars—particularly those little-known or “hidden” figures who contributed to the growth of the field. Chapter