PUBPOL 5343 - Program Evaluation for Executives

(KCM-HE, SBA-HE)

Fall. 1 credit. Letter grades only.

Enrollment limited to: Executive Master of Public Administration (EMPA) students.

N. Skinner.

This course is a general introduction to evaluation research for assessing social programs and interventions. The course uses an evolutionary and systems thinking perspective on evaluation. Students will learn essential concepts in program evaluation that will enable them to design a high-quality evaluation plan for a program or intervention. The basic steps involved in creating any evaluation plan are explained, including: 1) Preparation (entering the system, developing a memorandum of understanding, identifying internal stakeholders, creating working group(s), and assessing evaluation capacity); 2) Program Model Development (stakeholder analysis, program review, program boundary analysis, program lifecycle analysis, logic modeling, program pathway models, setting evaluation scope, identifying relevant prior research); and 3) Evaluation Plan Creation (evaluation purpose, evaluation questions/hypotheses, measurement, sampling, design, data management and analysis, reporting and utilization).

Outcome 1: Students will be able to describe evolutionary and systems thinking principles.

Outcome 2: Students will be able to describe how to prepare for an evaluation planning effort.

Outcome 3: Students will be able to describe the basic components of an evaluation plan, including evaluation questions, sampling, measurement, design and analysis.

Outcome 4: Students will be able to produce a high-quality program model report that could be used to plan an evaluation.