Evaluation designs for social programs are developed assuming minimal or no disruption from external shocks, such as natural disasters. This is because extremely rare shocks may not make it worthwhile to account for them in the design. Among extreme shocks is the 2010 Chile earthquake. Un Buen Comienzo (UBC), an ongoing early childhood program in…

The vocational education and training (VET) sector is a major pathway to post-school education for indigenous students, yet questions are being raised about the capacity of the VET system to provide successful outcomes for the indigenous apprentices and trainees it attracts. Within a system plagued by high cancellation rates in general, indigenous…

The article reports on the findings of a comparative case study of six projects that operated in Israel between 1980 and 2000. The study findings identify characteristics of the programs, the host organizations, and the social and political environment, which differentiated programs that are sustained from those that are not. The findings reaffirm…

The Office of Management and Budget has recommended the termination of numerous federal programs, citing a lack of program results as the primary reason for this decision. In response to this recommendation, several federal agencies have turned to logic modeling to demonstrate that programs are on the path to results accountability. However,…

Little is known about the payoffs to apprenticeship training in the German speaking countries for the participants. OLS estimates suggest that the returns are similar to those of other types of schooling. However, there is a lot of heterogeneity in the types of apprenticeships offered, and institutional descriptions suggest that there might be an…

As part of a program review process, an evaluation was done of the academic pharmacy programs at the University of Florida and Florida A & M University. The evaluation was based on site visits and review of all self-study materials. The most prominent finding and related recommendation for both programs was that Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy…

After 10 years of development, the California Statewide Automated Child Support System, run by the Department of Social Services (DSS), has been scrapped and the state has begun developing a new child support collection computer. This report evaluates the performance of publicly-funded child support collection programs in California, examining the…

This report focuses on productivity improvements in instructional programs at Illinois' public universities by providing an assessment of statewide instructional capacity. The report identifies 22 disciplines in which reduction, consolidation, or elimination of programs should be considered. It notes that when programs are offered by several…

Research shows that stability is one component of quality child care. We investigate the understudied phenomenon of the stability of child-care facilities over time, focusing on the province of British Columbia, Canada. Although net figures show growth in the number of providers between 1997 and 2001, they obfuscate a dramatic level of closure…

This paper presents the findings of a qualitative followup survey of a sample of programs listed in the 1986 "Directory of Evaluation Training Programs." Four programs listed in the directory are no longer considered evaluation training, and five, originally similar, are still going strong. A sampling strategy was used to compare the discontinued…

This report presents the findings of a visiting team charged with assessing Northeast Missouri State University's progress in 5 years toward goals from a new institutional mission and planning document. In particular the report endorses the 49 undergraduate programs and 9 graduate programs offered at NMSU each of which successfully attained the…

Developed by the Academic Senate Educational Policies Committee, this document focuses on program discontinuance issues faced by local academic senates. Addressed foremost is the need to identify key factors for developing a fair, equitable, and faculty-driven program discontinuance process. Although college districts are required by current…

The impact of discontinuing an academic program at St. Edward's University, Texas, was assessed by measurement on three levels: first-level effects on students and faculty; second-level effects on auxiliary offices and related courses and majors; and third-level effects on productivity and a profile of majors. Majors with a higher than average…

The Massachusetts Workplace Education Initiative (MWEI) was begun in 1985 as an inter-agency effort to bring adult basic education and English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) instruction directly into workplaces throughout the state. The impetus for the program was a concern for large numbers of workers who did not have the skills necessary to compete…

Texas educational legislation for 1991 required the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) to review the operations of, and the continuing need for, each of the four main campuses and five extension centers of the Texas State Technical College System (TSTCS), and to make recommendations concerning the facilities' continuation and/or…