Program Evaluation Services
A program evaluation is typically used to evaluate social programs, policies, and projects in areas like community services, education, employment, healthcare, and justice. Program evaluation uses rigorously tested methods for collecting, analyzing, and using information to answer questions. These typically relate to effectiveness and efficiency. Questions related to program improvement, usefulness, alternatives, and unintended outcomes can also be examined.
Our experience includes working at the federal government’s Centre of Excellence for Evaluation at the Treasury Board Secretariat. We have been pre-screened by the federal government to provide evaluation services equivalent to an ES-4 level analyst. We are also a member of the Canadian Evaluation Society, and regularly participate in professional development events with the local chapter. Using a participatory approach, our goal is to help create the right evaluation questions at the beginning. This ensures that the questions can be answered through data collection activities, which reduces costs. Examples of services that we have previously provided include:
- Assisted federal departments with obtaining program funding, by evaluating results based management and accountability framework (RMAF) documents, and Treasury Board submissions, to ensure they were completed correctly for Cabinet approval.
- Conducted a process evaluation to identify whether a new piece of software, used to track homeless shelter data, was being implemented as planned.
- Presented quarterly quality plan results that measured patient satisfaction to healthcare management.
Research Services
You can not get to where you want to go, if you do not know how to get there. Researching things like directions, distances, costs, and knowing the experiences of others, is all useful information to have for a long trip. The same can be said when it comes to designing and implementing a new policy or program for your stakeholders. We can help by providing you with evidence based research that provides the answers to your questions. Examples of services that we have previously provided include:
- Conducted an environmental scan for a non-profit organization, which examined similar organizations across Canada. It improved their ability to negotiate fair contracts with government departments.
- Created a best practices report to help improve the fund-raising capacity of a charitable organization.
- Improved the ability of a national survey to quickly collect quality data, by creating a simple worksheet.