Read the summary and the most important questions on Evaluation A Systematic Approach | 9780761908944 | Peter H. Rossi ; Mark W. Lipsey ; Howard E. Freeman.

• 3 Identifying issues and formulating questions

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• program process theory

  combination of the program's organizational plan and its service utilization plan in to an overall description of the assumptions and expectations about how the program is supposed to operate

• 2 ways to assess appropriateness of an evaluation question

  - examine in the context of actual program activities related to it
  - analyze in relationship to the experience and findings reported in applicable social science and social service literature

• unanswerable research question reasons

  1) ambiguous or vague
  2) few observable indicators that little can be learned about
  3) lack of sufficient indication of relevant criteria to be answered
  4) may be answerable but require more data, expertise, or resources 

• 5 program issues that provide guidance for research question

  1) need for program services
  2) program conceptualization or design
  3) program operations and service delivery
  4) program outcome
  5) program cost and efficiency

• 2 assumptions inherent to program 

  expectation that program actions will have the intended effects on proximal or immediate outcomes (program's "action theory")
  connect the proximal to the distal outcomes (conceptual theory/conceptual hypothesis)

• 5 Expressing and assessing program theory

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• Implicit program theory

  assumptions and expectations inherent in a program's services and practices that have not fully been articulated and recorded

• Black Box evaluation

  evaluation of program outcomes without the benefits of an articulated program theory to provide insight into what is presumed to be causing those outcomes and why

• Given an identified need, program decision makers must

  conceptualize a program capable of alleviating that need
  implement it

• first step in assessing program theory

  1) articulating program theory (produce and explicit description of yje conceptions, assumptions and expectations that constitute the rationale for the way the program is structured and operated)

• evaluability assessment 3 activities:

  1) description of program model (focus on articulating goals and objectives)
  represents most fully developed set of concepts and procedures available in the evaluation literature for describing and assessing a program's conceptualization of what it is supposed to be doing and why
  
  2) assessment of how well-defined and evaluable that program model is
  3) identification of stakeholder interests in evaluation and the likely use of findings