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Choosing an Evaluation Processes

Evaluation Methods & Data Collection

This is where the going gets a little bit tough. This is where you have to make some of the hard decisions about what you want to do.

The very first decision is about the broad methodological orientation to use:

• Qualitative type methodology
• Quantitative based methodology
• Mixed methodology

Your choice depends a great deal on a combination of:

• your research skills
  • you should check out the self-assesment pages

• the organisational imperatives about evaluation data
  • does your organisation expect quantitive/numerical reports
  • will it accept descriptive information on evaluation
  • does it want to have data for benchmarking or best practice

• what approach you are most comfortable with
  • are you happy to focus on quantitative data analysis
  • are you uncomfortable in using comments and impressions in reporting evaluations
  • would you feel that you were obtaining more valuable data if you collected qualitative and impressionistic data.