From the AES President

The end of the year is fast approaching and we can look back at some significant changes for AES. The new constitution was adopted at the AGM in Canberra and the new governance structure comes in on 1 February 2010. Graeme Harvey in his former role as vice president spent a lot of time ensuring that this process went smoothly through the various stages joined by Alan Woodward and Neil Porter who liaised with the lawyers over the final alterations. This has been quite a drawn out process but we can now feel confident that our governance meets the standards set and the constitution matches what is and should be done.

Fears that the economic recession might adversely affect the AES Annual International Conference in Canberra happily proved to be unfounded. Over 400 participants engaged in lively debate over the three days of the conference itself and in the preceding two days of workshops took the opportunity for professional learning in a stimulating and collegial environment. I am sure that the organising committee will be very pleased with the way it all went and relieved that in 2010 they can attend a conference that they have not been involved in organising. An enormous amount of effort by a lot of people goes in to making a conference happen and I know that AES members are cognisant of this – and appreciative.

The theme of the conference - Evidence and Evaluation – gave participants the opportunity to look at a wide range of issues such as what constitutes credible evidence, what is ‘enough’ evidence and, more generally, what is the evidence to show that evaluation is useful? The Oxford New Zealand dictionary provides the following definition: “evidence - the available facts, circumstances etc supporting or otherwise, a belief, proposition etc or indicating whether or not a thing is true or valid (p370).” I think by the end of the week this was a concept that had been thoroughly explored and all possible ‘etcs’ canvassed. Participants left the conference with a great deal to think about - and even a few more AES activities to be involved with before the end of the year.

This is Brad Shrimpton’s last ENews as editor and I would like to thank him for all the work he has done getting contributions for each edition and wish him all the best in his new non-AES activities. And of course - I would like to wish you all the best for the festive season and look forward to a stimulating new year!

Associate Professor Jenny Neale - AES President

2009 AES Conference Presentations

Are now up on the AES website at http://www.aes.asn.au/conferences/ . If you did not provide your paper to the conference organisers after the conference you can still send it directly to the AES office at aes@aes.asn.au and it will be uploaded.

AES Awards Recipients

The aim of the AES Awards for Excellence in Evaluation is to encourage the development of evaluation and high quality evaluation practice in Australasia. In 2009 the following awards were presented at the 2009 AES International Conference dinner in Canberra:

Two Awards that recognise individual evaluators (nominated by their peers) were awarded as follows: -

• The Emerging New Talent Award 2009 was presented to Ms Jessica Kenway

• The Outstanding Contribution to Evaluation (ET&S) Award 2009 was presented to Professor Rick Cummings - Murdoch University.

Three Awards that recognise organisations, project teams, evaluation projects or programs (nominated by the evaluators themselves) were awarded as follows:-

• The Best Evaluation Publication (Caulley Tulloch) Award 2009 was presented to: Coffey International Development (Jennifer Rush: Monitoring and Evaluation Advisor 2006-2009) for “Changing Lives: Stories from the Australia Papua New Guinea Incentive Fund. An AusAID Program 2000-2008”

• The Best Evaluation Study Award 2009 was presented to: Rosemarie Tweedie, Mary Carey, Kim Stewart - Baptist Community Services (NSW & ACT) for Client Perception of Value Project - Residential Aged Care Services

• The Best Evaluation Policy and Systems Award 2009 was presented to: Jane Pirkis, Fay Kohn, Bridget Bassilios, Justine Fletcher, Kylie King, Grant Blashki, Philip Burgess - Centre for Health Policy, School of Population Health, University of Melbourne for their longitudinal evaluation of the Allied Health Services Component of the federal government’s Better Outcomes in Mental Health Care Initiative.

Congratulations to all recipients! Full details of these nominations will appear in the Evaluation Journal of Australasia, Vol 9 No 2.

(thank you to Judy Pearce for this item)

AES Conference Wellington

In 2010 wonderful Wellington will host the AES International Conference. The conference theme is ‘Reflecting on Evaluation’ and a number of outstanding key note speakers are already listed on the conference website including former AEA President, Donna Mertens.

Proposals are due 16th April – for more information be sure to visit the conference website at:
http://www.aesconference2010.org.nz/drupal/home

News from the Professional Learning Committee

A number of AES professional learning activities will be available in 2010.  These include: a range of events organised by the AES regional groups throughout the year; a series of workshops conducted at various sites across Australia and New Zealand in April and May; and, a program of pre-conference workshops (30-31 August) and conference sessions (1-3 September) at the AES International 2010 Conference in Wellington, New Zealand.  Details of activities will be publicised on the AES website as they become available, and will also be communicated to AES members by email. 

For details of what is happening in your region, see the website at: http://www.aes.asn.au/regions/

Suggestions for professional learning activities are always welcome, and may be sent to the Professional Learning Committee via the AES email address: aes@aes.asn.au

Dr Paul Chesterton - Committee Chair

Special Interest Group

Realist Evaluation and Realist Synthesis

A reminder to AES members with an interest in Realist Evaluation that a special interest group has been set up with Dr Gill Westhorp as the convenor. A Master Class in Realist Synthesis will also be conducted in Adelaide in late February 2010.

Gill can be contacted at: gill@communitymatters.com.au

Publications News

New Book: Research Integration using Dialogue Methods by David McDonald, Gabriele Bammer & Peter Deane

Research and evaluation addressing real-world, complex problems such as the restoration of wetlands, the needs of the elderly, effective disaster response and the future of the airline industry require expert knowledge from a range of disciplines, as well as from stakeholders affected by the problem and those in a position to do something about it. This book charts new territory in taking a systematic approach to research integration using dialogue methods to bring together multiple perspectives. These are illustrated by case studies from four areas of research and evaluation: the environment; public health; security; and technological innovation.

Research Integration using Dialogue Methods has been published as an ebook (free download from http://epress.anu.edu.au/dialogue_methods_citation.html ) and also available as print-on-demand from the same site.

Please note: the authors welcome feedback on this book - an online facility for this is under development at: http://i2s.anu.edu.au/ .

(Thank you to David McDonald for contributing this item)

Websites to Visit and More

A new issue of the journal ‘Evaluation and the Health Professions’ is available online at:
http://ehp.sagepub.com/content/vol32/issue4/

Visit this link to download a presentation given at AEA 2009 on using Success Stories as a technique to communicate evaluation results:
http://ow.ly/EzwB

Browse the treasure trove that is the WWW Virtual Library on Evaluation at:
http://www.policy-evaluation.org/

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 click on the 'Regions' link on the AES website. www.aes.asn.au/regions/

Welcome New Members

Auckland

Canberra Region

New South Wales

Northern Territory

Queensland

South Australia

Victoria

Western Australia

Wellington

International

AES Xmas/New Year Office Hours

The AES Office will close on Wednesday 23 December and reopen on Monday 11 January.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all AES members!