AES E-Newsletter - April 2007
In this Easter egg breaking issue:
AES E-news Archive
AES President’s
Report
Governance
As many of you will know, the Board
has commissioned a review of the governance of the Society, with the intention
that the review would cover structure, size and function of the Executive and
the Board, and processes of governance. It has been some time since the Society
has comprehensively reviewed its governance, and given the substantial growth
in numbers, up to 850 at the end of 2006; income to over $200,000 in this
financial year; and activities including 15 regional workshops already this
financial year, it is timely to have a good look at how we run the Society to
ensure it is done properly and in line with the values of the Society. The
Board conducted a tendering process and has contracted Ted Dahms of Plum
Concepts and Solutions to conduct the review. Ted is collecting information
through several avenues including a survey of members, interviews with a
selection of Board members, regional representatives, committee chairs, and
Fellows, information from three other societies involved in our benchmarking
initiative and an analysis of AES documents. You will have received an email about completing the survey online (a
link can be found below) and I strongly encourage you to complete it to let us
know what you are happy with and what you would like to see improved in the
Society’s governance structures and processes. Ted will be producing an
interim report towards the end of April which will be circulated to the Board
for comment. The review is scheduled to be completed in July and any changes to
the governance of the Society will be discussed at the AGM at the
Workshops
In line with the aims of the
Society, we have steadily increased our involvement in evaluation development
activities over the past few years. The most obvious of these is the increase
in the number of workshops conducted in the regions from 6 in 2002/3 to 15 in
the first half of 2006/7. A new policy on workshops conducted in the regions
and at the conference has been developed for the Board by Jenny Neale, Diana
Beere, Chris Milne and Jerry Winston. However, the Society has also moved into
more substantial projects in 2006 including administering the highly successful
IPDET course which preceded the Darwin Conference and an innovative program of
professional development workshops which the ACT committee developed with the
Commonwealth Government Department of Families, Community Services and
Indigenous Affairs. These initiatives involved substantial budgets and
administration by Judy Pearce in the AES office and produced considerable
benefits for the Society including attracting a number of new members,
contributing to increasing evaluation capacity and producing substantial
goodwill and net income for the Society. We plan to continue to undertake
initiatives such as these and are currently revising the Special Projects
Policy to cover this type of higher risk initiative.
Conference
You can’t have missed the
substantial promotion efforts underway for the 2007 Conference in
Dr Rick Cummings - AES President
AES 2007
Melbourne
Conference Update
AES International Conference -
Doing Evaluation Better
September 3-7, 2007
The Melbourne Conference Planning
Committee would like to thank everyone for the huge response to the conference
call for proposals. The fascinating range of topics submitted for long and
short papers, think tanks, round tables and workshops should make for a great
conference in marvellous
Professor Ray Pawson – Ray will reflect on the
achievements of evaluation and whether it has produced a transferable, durable
and cumulative body of knowledge.
Professor Hallie Preskill – Hallie will present on
building evaluation capacity and linking evaluation to organisational learning.
Professor Helen Simons – Helen will reflect on her
evaluation practices that embody humanistic methodologies and participatory
principles to give autonomy and skills to organisations to continue their own
development.
Ms Sue Soal – Sue will present on
building evaluation into one’s own organisational practice and
management.
All keynotes will be providing
workshop sessions and details will be available in the registration brochure to
be distributed to members shortly. Early Bird registrations for pre-conference
workshops and the conference program will close on 20 July 2007.
We look forward to seeing you in
marvellous
Dr Graeme Harvey - Conference
Convenor
AES Awards
The new suite of AES Awards has been
released by the AES Awards Committee and nominations are now open. The new
suite of Awards was created in response to feedback from AES members and
following a major review of the previous AES Awards. The seven AES Awards for
Excellence in Evaluation include:
- Two Awards that recognise individual evaluators
(nominated by their peers) - The
Emerging New Talent Awards and The Outstanding Contribution to
Evaluation (ET&S) Award
- The Best Evaluation
Publication Award (The Caulley Tulloch Award)
- The Best Evaluation
Study Award
- The Best Evaluation
Policy and Systems Award
- The Community
Development Evaluation Award
- The Indigenous
Evaluation Award
With the new suite of awards the
committee have attempted to present a group of Awards that reflects the scope
of evaluation works currently being undertaken in
The new AES Awards brochure for 2007
including the nomination form has been sent to all AES members and is also
available on the AES website - www.aes.asn.au.
Nominations for all Awards close on
30 June 2007.
Professor Peter Bycroft –
Awards Committee (Chair)
Upcoming Seminars
AES
John Owen will be holding a seminar
titled ‘Emerging Approaches to Program Clarification in
The Queensland Regional Group is
holding a lunchtime seminar titled ‘Supporting improved performance:
Evaluation as a pillar of performance management presented by Dr Kathy Corbiere
on April 17th. More information
at the Queensland page.
Association for Qualitative Research
AQR are holding a number of workshops and seminars in 2007. Topics include conducting literature reviews, narrative inquiry and working with international research students. More information
Clear Horizon
Over the next two months Clear Horizon are holding workshops on a range of topics including Most Significant Change, ‘People Centred Program Logic’ and Qualitative Methods in Evaluation. More information
International News and Conferences
IOCE (International Organisation
for Cooperation in Evaluation) Publication
After an extended development period
‘Creating and Developing Evaluation Organizations. Lessons from Africa,
Asia,
Penny Hawkins - International
Relations Committee (Chair)
Conferences - North America
American
Evaluation Association 2007 Conference
Date: November 5 – November 7 & 11, 2007
Where:
Theme ‘Evaluation and
Learning’
According to the conference website:
“Throughout this event, we
will be exploring what it means to learn from evaluation and the ways in which
evaluation facilitates learning at the individual, group, organization,
community, and policy levels.” Also, there will be ten $500 (
Publications News
Publications
Committee Report
The Publications Committee has been
busy during 2007 and has the exciting news there is the possibility that:
Firstly, the AES provide access, as
part of the annual membership, to Evaluation and Program Planning, which is
published in the
There has been some discussion about this at Board level, and they are favourably disposed, to the option offered by Elsevier with the publishers to provide members of the AES with online access to issues of EPP back to 1995. There are no archival rights attached to this access. This access is based on a rolling year subscription. Society members receive access for a full 12 month period from the date that the access is switched on.
Next, there is also the possibility
that EJA will be made available online. Some members have requested this as an
alternative to the paper copy. Other members would like to have both versions
at the time each edition is published. Access to both EJA and EPP would be via
a password. Members can opt for mode of delivery when they renew their
membership or on joining. The AES may save on paper copy costs.
Also, we are gradually catching up
with the journal and hope to have the first edition for this year out by the
end of June. The June edition will have a special section on indigenous
evaluation. We are keeping in touch with our copy editors and the editors plan
to meet with them soon to discuss various matters related to the paper
production of the journal.
Any comments about these items are
welcome.
Dr John Owen - Publications
Committee (Chair)
Thinking of catching up on some
evaluation reading?
Daniel L Stufflebeam and Anthony J
Shinkfield recently completed their fourth book entitled Evaluation Theory,
Models and Applications (752 pages, Jossey-Bass, San Francisco). The Publishers
have this to say about the book:
Evaluation Theory, Models, and Applications is designed for evaluators and students who need to develop a
commanding knowledge of the evaluation field: its history, theory and
standards, models and approaches, procedures, and inclusion of personnel as
well as program evaluation. This
important book shows how to choose from a growing array of program evaluation
approaches.
More
Thank you to Dr Tony Shinkfield of
Evaluation Resources on the Net
Interested in Empowerment
Evaluation?
David Fetterman has established a Empowerment Evaluation blog. According to his website the blog is “designed to provide us with a place to discuss issues, recommend books and software tools, and remain current (visitors) are free to post EE related issues on the blog, including upcoming professional association activities”. The blog can be found here.
AES Ethics Committee
The Ethics Committee plays a
valuable role in fostering discussion on ethical issues for evaluators, and
promoting general awareness amongst AES members of the AES Code of Ethics.
This year, the Ethics Committee will
work with the AES Board and others to support a series of workshops on ethics
in evaluation. While the details of these workshops are still to be developed,
there has been keen interest in ethics as a topic for professional development
workshops amongst the AES membership.
The Ethics Committee will also
develop a session for the AES Conference, later in 2007, to again promote
discussion and use of the AES Code of Ethics to support evaluators.
The existing membership of the Ethics Committee is Bron McDonald, John Alder and David Turner. There is scope for additional members, and if you are interested in joining the Ethics Committee, please email the Chair, Alan Woodward.
Alan Woodward – Ethics
Committee (Chair)
Governance Survey
Another quick reminder to complete the AES governance survey. The survey provides Members with an opportunity to contribute to the sound governance of the Society. The Survey closes on Thursday 12 April and should take about 10-15 minutes.
The Survey can be accessed here.
Positions Vacant
Local Jobs
Looking for a new job? Visit the of interest page on the AES
website.
Looking for new staff? Contact the AES office to
advertise positions on the AES website.
Get Involved in Your Regional Branch
To contact your region representative or to access the latest reports and
news on upcoming activities at your local AES branch visit your region's page link on the AES website.
Contact the E-News Editor
If you have contributions or a notice for E-news please email the E-news editor, Brad Shrimpton.