In this assignment, you will develop an outcome evaluation design, along with outcome measures for the Medicine Hat’s Women’s Shelter Safe Families Intervention Team Final Evaluation Report. Use the logic model download from the report.
Provide at least two quantitative measures for each short-term, intermediate, and long-term outcome listed in the program logic model (so you will write 24 measures in total).
Chapter 4 of your textbook will provide guidance for this assignment—in particular, the sections on Sources of Data for Evaluation (pages 68-75) and Gathering Information Wisely (pages 76-83).
It is common for people untrained in evaluation to be much too vague in developing evaluation measures, so you will need to be VERY specific. “In general, the more a measurement tool focuses on objective behaviour than on ill-defined or vague terms, the more likely it is to be valid. Objective behaviours (such as ‘late to work less often than once a week’ or ‘speaks in groups’) can be more validly measured than traits (such as ‘punctual’ and ‘assertive’), regardless of the specific measurement approach chosen” (Mager, 1997, as cited in Posavac, 2011, p. 79).
Often, tracking process or implementation entails simple counting, as you discovered in Assignment #2. Outcomes are a bit more tricky, but also more interesting. For example, for the short-term outcome, “Opportunity for Intervention,” one would want to clarify with the SFIT staff what they mean by opportunity for intervention. This could simply be measured by how many victims they are able to contact, or it could be taken a step further and be measured by the number of victims who accept SFIT services. For “Victim Understands Domestic Violence,” victims could be given a questionnaire asking key questions about domestic violence to see how accurate they are (like a quiz of sorts) or they could simply be asked if they feel they understand domestic violence better than they did before SFIT. These different criteria have different strengths and weaknesses. Actually testing victims on the concepts of domestic violence would be a higher quality measure of their understanding, but it can be difficult and time-consuming to create an appropriate assessment, and victims may not appreciate being tested. A number of them may be unwilling to complete the questionnaire, contributing to a higher level of missing data and limiting the conclusions that can be drawn from the results.
Recall the exemplar from Assignment #2, which was built based on the impact model on page 48 in your textbook. As you will recall, the overall evaluation question for this program is whether this psychoeducational program provided by nurses helped surgical patients leave the hospital sooner without ill effects.
Impact Model from page 48 with Measures.pdf download
Consider writing your evaluation findings when developing your measures – what would that sound like? Thinking about the results that you would expect to report from the measures you are developing may help you be appropriately specific.
You will also choose an evaluation design from Chapters 9 or 10. Provide your rationale for using the design you selected (along with any threats to internal validity that you will need to be aware of for the design that you chose). If your evaluation design is not appropriate for all outcomes/measures, identify which outcomes/measures would be included in the design and why.
This assignment should be structured as a brief evaluation proposal. Provide a brief introduction, the evaluation design, evaluation measures for each outcome, and a brief conclusion. Your paper should appear as a professional document, including a title page. If you cite any sources, use APA formatting for in-text citations and your reference page.
Your proposal should be approximately six pages in length, double-spaced (not including title page or references).
