Educational Program Evaluations Some Implications for Evaluation Policy, a Summary: A. INTRODUCTION B. HISTORY IN BRIEF AND ITS IMPLICATIONS PRINCIPLE: HISTORY IMPLICATION: HISTORY AND EXPECTATIONS IMPLICATION: SUCCESS RATE IMPLICATION: DISCIPLINARY CATHOLICITY PRINCIPLE: VARIETY IN FUNCTION AND DEFINITION IMPLICATION: STATUTE AND REGULATION IMPLICATION: GLOSSARY AND GUIDES C. DESIGN OF OUTCOME EVALUATIONS PRINCIPLE: QUALITY IN DESIGN IMPLICATION: QUALITY AND EVALUATION POLICY IMPLICATION: EVALUABILITY IMPLICATION: COMPONENT-WISE TESTING IMPLICATION: RANDOMIZED TESTS IMPLICATION: SINGLE TIME SURVEYS IMPLICATIONS: SCALE, GENERALIZABILITY, AND SEQUENCES D. IMPLEMENTATION OF NEW PROGRAMS AND THEIR EVALUATION PRINCIPLE: IMPLEMENTATION OF PROGRAMS IMPLICATION: MEASURES OF PROGRAM IMPLEMENTATION E. ANALYSIS PRINCIPLE: ANALYSIS IMPLICATION: SECONDARY ANALYSIS IMPLICATION: ARCHIVES IMPLICATION: PRIVACY F. DOCUMENTATION PRINCIPLE IMPLICATION: DATA ON COSTS IMPLICATION: DOCUMENTATION ON PROGRAMS IMPLICATION: DOCUMENTATION ON DATA DOCUMENTATION ON EVALUATION NOTE REFERENCES

Abstract

Attempting to understand which of several policies or programs has the greater benefit is not, of course, a novel human enterprise. The idea of conducting comparative tests to understand how children learn speech, for instance, was espoused by Akbar the Great in fourteenth-century India. The notion of formally separating competing explanations of human development among other efforts to understand biosocial phenomena is explicit in rabbinic theories of evidence of the same period. Nor...