Evaluation Plans

An evaluation plan can serve as a contract or a memorandum of agreement between the evaluator and the client. As with a contract, it defines the roles and responsibilities of the evaluator and the client. The basic components of an evaluation include (a) a statement about the background of and rationale for the program, (b) a list of the stakeholders in the evaluation, (c) the purpose of the evaluation, and (d) the key questions to be answered by the evaluation. Each of these components will be briefly discussed.

The evaluator can obtain some initial information on the background and rationale for the program, process, or product by reviewing available documents and records. This information should be supplemented through meetings held with various stakeholders.

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Each evaluation has several levels of stakeholders. In the evaluation plan, it is important to distinguish these different levels. The primary stakeholder is typically the person, group, or organization responsible for the evaluation development and funding; thus, in many cases, the primary stakeholder can be viewed as the client. Secondary stakeholders may not have financial control over the evaluation, but they may be affected by the evaluation and its results. Meetings with these various stakeholders can help the evaluator gather needed information on the background of the program, process, or product; the specific purpose(s) of the evaluation; and the key questions for the evaluation. Questions that can be asked of these stakeholders to elicit this information include (a) What is your role in the program? (b) What are your observations about the program? (c) What are the goals of the program? (d) What concerns do you have about the program? (e) What do you hope to learn from the evaluation? (f) What roles and responsibilities do you want to assume in the conduct of the evaluation? (g) What decisions do you want to make that will be based on the evaluation? and (h) When do you have to have the information from the evaluation? A dialogue among the stakeholders can help to identify areas in which views of the program, process, or product are similar or different. Such dialogue can also point out unstated goals. Indeed, the evaluator may use these meetings with stakeholders to develop a “logic model,” or the expected links from the funding or initiation of the program, process, or product to the expected outcomes.

The evaluation plan should also contain a brief statement as to the purpose of the evaluation. This will help to clarify to the client, the stakeholders, and the evaluation whether the evaluation is a needs assessment, a developmental evaluation, a formative evaluation, or a summative evaluation (focused on monitoring and auditing, on outcomes, on impacts, or on performance measurement, respectively). It is also useful to include a statement about how the evaluation findings will be used.

The final element of the evaluation consists of the key evaluation questions. These are the small set of questions guiding the evaluation.