Definition
Evaluation is the structured interpretation and giving of meaning to predicted or actual impacts of proposals or results. It looks at original objectives, and at what is either predicted or what was accomplished and how it was accomplished. So evaluation can be formative, that is taking place during the development of a concept or proposal, project or organization, with the intention of improving the value or effectiveness of the proposal, project or organisation. It can also be summative, drawing lessons from a completed action or project or an organisation at a later point in time or circumstance.
Evaluation is inherently a theoretically informed approach (whether explicitly or not), and consequently any particular definition of evaluation would have be tailored to its context - the theory, approach, needs, purpose and methodology of the evaluation process itself. Having said this, evaluation has been defined as:
- A systematic, rigorous, and meticulous application of scientific methods to assess the design, implementation, improvement or outcomes of a program. It is a resource-intensive process, frequently requiring resources, such as, evaluator expertise, labour, time and a sizeable budget
- 'The critical assessment, in as objective a manner as possible, of the degree to which a service or its component parts fulfils stated goals' (St Leger and Walsworth-Bell). The focus of this definition is on attaining objective knowledge, and scientifically or quantitatively measuring predetermined and external concepts.
- 'A study designed to assist some audience to assess an object's merit and worth' (Shufflebeam). In this definition the focus is on facts as well as value laden judgements of the programs outcomes and worth.
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Famous quotes containing the word definition:
“One definition of man is “an intelligence served by organs.””
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Mothers often are too easily intimidated by their children’s negative reactions...When the child cries or is unhappy, the mother reads this as meaning that she is a failure. This is why it is so important for a mother to know...that the process of growing up involves by definition things that her child is not going to like. Her job is not to create a bed of roses, but to help him learn how to pick his way through the thorns.”
—Elaine Heffner (20th century)
“Although there is no universal agreement as to a definition of life, its biological manifestations are generally considered to be organization, metabolism, growth, irritability, adaptation, and reproduction.”
—The Columbia Encyclopedia, Fifth Edition, the first sentence of the article on “life” (based on wording in the First Edition, 1935)