Issues in evaluating the community benefits of social interventions
Edited book (chapter)
Chapter Title | Issues in evaluating the community benefits of social interventions |
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Book Chapter Category | Edited book (chapter) |
ERA Publisher ID | 2778 |
Book Title | Community capacity building: lessons from adult learning in Australia |
Authors | Toleman, Mark (Author) and Blake, Jacqueline (Author) |
Editors | Postle, Glen David, Burton, Lorelle Jane and Danaher, Patrick Alan |
Page Range | 193-204 |
Chapter Number | 12 |
Year | 2014 |
Publisher | NIACE |
Place of Publication | Leicester, United Kingdom |
ISBN | 9781862017221 |
9781862017252 | |
Web Address (URL) | http://www.niace.org.uk |
Abstract | The current economic environment ensures that the demand for public and private funds for social initiatives is increasing at a time when the availability of funds for such programs is decreasing. Funding bodies have a duty to ensure that the funds they expend on social change programs are well spent and not just from the perspective of financial audit - increasingly they require evaluation of the program for its effect on social change. Funding bodies wish to gauge the public value of their social spend in particular before committing to further funding. Program evaluation is not a trivial exercise but it is often not front and centre in the minds of the program designers. One of the means of ensuring that this public value from social programs is measured is to build evaluation mechanisms into a program's design. For social programs one of the constructs that can provide boundaries for this evaluation is the concept of community - and in this chapter the focus is on community capacity. However, setting the parameters for evaluating a community's capacity is difficult, although various parameters have been investigated in the past. This issue and others that are related - such as the difficulty of deciding the boundaries of a community and the desired timeframe available for evaluation - are discussed in this chapter. In addition, the current practice of social program evaluation, as described by examples in this collection, is considered. |
Keywords | community engagement; social program evaluation; government funding |
ANZSRC Field of Research 2020 | 441006. Sociological methodology and research methods |
440712. Social policy | |
520599. Social and personality psychology not elsewhere classified | |
Public Notes | Files associated with this item cannot be displayed due to copyright restrictions. |
Byline Affiliations | School of Management and Enterprise |
School of Information Systems | |
Institution of Origin | University of Southern Queensland |
https://research.usq.edu.au/item/q2x88/issues-in-evaluating-the-community-benefits-of-social-interventions
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