Made to Measure: Qualitative Data and Evaluation Empowerment Research. 1999.

A presentation to the 5^th International Qualitative Health Research Conference, University of Newcastle, Australia. Based on the regional CAPC evaluation.
By Nicole Bernard, Pauline Raven, Michelle Rivard, Yolande Samson, Madine VanderPlaat, and Lynn Vivian Book
8 pages
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Description

Made to Measure is a paper presented by staff of Health Canada's Population and Public Health Branch, Atlantic Region, in April 1999 to the 5^th International Qualitative Health Research Conference. The paper represents the views of government managers, community workers, and one of the principal researchers who worked on the Atlantic Region evaluation of the Community Action Program for Children (CAPC), a community-based health promotion program. The evaluation was carried out using a qualitative, participatory action research approach.

The paper examines the issues that arose at various stages in the evaluation and describes how they were addressed by reconstructing the research team's understanding of "empowerment," a term that has permeated the literature in the past decade. In particular, the paper highlights some of what research team members learned as they struggled to reconcile the principles and politics of a participatory and qualitative approach to research with the conventional demands of program evaluation. The team's efforts to translate what they learned into practice are also discussed. The paper concludes by listing three key outcomes of using an empowerment model for evaluating CAPC:

• The research team discovered the most important things about the program because they involved program participants in the analysis and interpretation of the data.
• The research team discovered that participants define the same activities in different ways and that this has an impact on the interpretation of information.
• The needs of participants emerge and evolve over time; therefore, it is critical that the needs of the population not be defined up front and that the structure of the program and the evaluation not be based on predetermined needs.

Credits

Made to Measure was written by Nicole Bernard, Pauline Raven, Michelle Rivard, Yolande Samson, Madine VanderPlaat, and Lynn Vivian Book for presentation at the 5th International Qualitative Health Research Conference, 1999.

Availability

This publication is available for download in English (20 KB) and French (22 KB). You will require the Adobe Acrobat Reader.

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