Program Evaluation of the Gathering House
Overview of Gathering House
The Gathering House is a non-profit organization with the primary aim of serving families with either injured or ill children across the globe. The primary focus of the organization is to address the critical needs of children by catering for the needs of their families. The organization has both internal and external stakeholders. The internal stakeholders include the board of directors and volunteers, whereas some of the external shareholders include families of affected children, government entities, health practitioners, social workers and donors. The company is a home away from home because it provides a conducive home-environment for both affected children and their parents, including other stakeholders.
Purpose of Program Evaluation
This is an outcome- evaluation of the Gathering House because it intends to demonstrate how the program is meeting its objectives and any modifications that may be necessary to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the program. Outcome-evaluation is important because serving the needs of ill or injured children is a complex process that involves a number of stakeholders. Therefore, the program evaluation is to assess the degree to which the objectives of the Gathering House are being met and any modifications that may be required. Outcome-evaluation of the organization is important in boosting the confidence of donors who put their resources to ensure that the program is smoothly running to achieve its objectives. It is also important for internal stakeholders like board of directors and employees because it will help them in assessing the performance of the program. At the same time, external stakeholders like medical practitioners are also interested in understanding how the program is performing. The program evaluation is therefore important is boosting the general performance of the Gathering House.
Organization Outcomes
Being that the main objective of Gathering House is to improve the health and well-being of children, its main outcome is also the improvement in the health and well-being of the children who are ill or those with injuries. The organization has also been able to spread to various countries in the globe to offer health services to the children who are ill or injured, which is another important outcome because it intends to have its branches across the globe. As a result, the number of children receiving health services from the Gathering house has increased significantly. In addition, the quality of the health care services that the organization offers to its clients has also improved because it has been able to attract more donors who have been able to finance the program to meet its objectives. Therefore, the organization outcomes are in the lines of the objectives of the Gathering House.
Activity Goals
The primary goal of the program is to offer services to families with ill or injured children across the world with the mission of improving the health and well-being of children in different parts of the world. Even children can get those services from various health centers across the globe; Gathering House is to provide a conducive environment that is lacking in many hospitals because it creates a comfortable home for the affected children and their families without considering their backgrounds. The Gathering House will accommodate any child that needs the services it offers. Therefore, some of the goals are to accommodate children from diverse backgrounds, operate all the times to ensure that affected children get the services they need, and provide a place where families can call home.
Measurement of the Accomplishment of Goals
In order to measure the progress the Gathering House in achieving its goals, first, it will consider the number of homes it has established across the globe. To ensure that families with ill or injured children get the services, the organization must have as many numbers of homes as possible across the globe. Its wide scope requires that it establishes many homes worldwide to reach as many clients as possible. Secondly, the organization will measure the progress of its goals by the number of children seeking for its services. The goals will be deemed successful if many families of affected children are seeking help from the homes established by Gathering House in various parts of the world. The main objective of the organization is to serve as many serve families with ill or injured children, therefore, the goals will only be successful if it offers its services to a large number of affected children.
In addition, the progress of the program will be measured by determining the number of donors who are willing to finance the program and the number of volunteers interested in offering their services at the established homes. Finally, the progress of the goals will be measured by considering the number of families interested in taking their children to receive the services and their willingness to spend time with them. Therefore, the progress of the accomplishment of the goals of the program will be determined by the number of homes established in different parts of the country, the number of children served, the number of donors, and willingness of parents to take their children to the Gathering House.
How External Evaluator would Conduct Program Evaluation
If an external program evaluator was to carry out the evaluation, the organization would expect him or her to first evaluate the number of homes that the Gathering House has in different parts of the world. The external evaluator should be keen to monitor the progress in the number of homes. Secondly, the external program evaluator should analyze the progress in the number of children being served by the organization. The number of ill or injured children seeking for services and being served by the organization should increase. In addition, the external program evaluator should evaluate the financial standings of the organization by considering the number of donors. At the same time, the external evaluator should the nature and quality of services offered by the organization. The above factors to be evaluated are important in determining the progress and success of the program because they directly influence the objectives and goals of Gathering House.
Approaches to Evaluation
Some of the fundamental approaches that are important in this program evaluation include objective-based, accountability, decision-oriented, and consumer-oriented. Objective-based approach is important in this evaluation because it portrays the true picture of the program while at the same time it appeals to common sense (Conley-Tyler, 2005). Accountability is also advantageous in this program evaluation because it helps in improving the quality of services that will be offered at the Gathering House. When the people involved in the day-to-day operations are held accountable for their actions and decisions, the Gathering House will be able to effectively and efficiently meet the goals and objectives. Decision-oriented evaluation approach is also important in this program evaluation because it helps in effectively planning and executing the needed services that can improve the health and well-being of children. The final fundamental approach that is necessary in the program is consumer-oriented because it encourages independent evaluation aimed at improving the services offered at Gathering House.
Moral, Legal, and Political Issues
The program evaluation on the progress of Gathering House will be ethical and will consider all moral issues that may interfere with the objectivity of the evaluation. First, the program evaluation will ensure that it accommodates both negative and positive feedbacks that generated from the evaluation. The evaluators will not omit any negative findings to ensure that it identifies the areas of weaknesses that need to be improved (Thompson, 1992). In addition, the program evaluation will ensure that there is no exaggeration in the successes or positive achievements of the organization, which is important in ensuring that the evaluation is truthful and fair. The Gathering House will also ensure the morality of the program evaluation by ensuring that the results are only released after complete evaluation and it is not leaked to the public before the date of release. Finally, to ensure the morality of evaluation, necessary stakeholders will be included in the evaluation process to ensure that their views and opinions are also considered. Therefore, the evaluation will be ethical, competent, accountable, and of high moral value.
Any program that touches on the lives of citizens is likely to generate some political issues or interests that may affect its evaluation. Some of the political issues may emerge in determining the purpose of program evaluation and how to measure the success and failure of the program. Political issues are also likely to come out during project evaluation in determining the variables to measure during the evaluation process. In addition, the trust factor and the subjective interpretation of reality are also likely to cause some political issues during the evaluation. However, in order to reduce the possible political issues that may interfere with the program evaluation, Gathering House will involve all stakeholders in the evaluation process to avoid any potential conflict (Lipsky et al., 2007). When stakeholders are given time and chance to contribute during the program evaluation, they are likely to build consensus and agree on issues that are likely to generate some politics. Involving stakeholders will also be important in building the trust of the parties involved and the people affected by the program like families and donors. Evaluators will also come up with evaluation logic models to reduce the misunderstandings of the primary and secondary stakeholders involved in the program. However, it is important for all parties to understand the logic model that has been built to reduce conflict and misunderstandings that can emerge.
References
Conley-Tyler, M. (2005). A fundamental choice: internal or external evaluation?. Evaluation Journal of Australasia, 4(1/2), 3.
Lipsky, D. B., Seeber, R. L., Avgar, A. C., & Scanza, R. M. (2007). Managing the Politics of Evaluation: Lessons from the Evaluation of ADR Programs.
Thompson, A. (1992). The ethics and politics of evaluation. Issues in educational research, 2(1), 35-44.
