Update from ALES training event:evaluating projects

Those of you who were able to attend the ALES training event, Not just for the Children, in Hull last week will have heard Jane Avison’s interesting talk on evaluating projects. Jane focussed on four essential components to successful evaluation:
Listening to stakeholders’ requirements and speaking their language
Understanding what drives the stakeholders and being aware of what they need to achieve and how it will be measured
Setting clear boundaries so that partners know precisely who is doing what
Collecting the right evidence at the right time so that the project can be mapped from start to finish

In relation to the first of these components I would draw your attention to a new paper that has just been issued by Scottish Government: Strategic Guidance for Community Planning Partnerships: Community Learning and Development. It can be accessed as a pdf at http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/0039/00394611.pdf, and provides an introduction to the language that community events in Scotland will need to speak over the next few years.

Those of you who couldn’t make the conference – commiserations! But the papers will hopefully go up on the ALES pages of the ARA website (http://www.archives.org.uk/si-aelg/news-and-events.html ) in the near future.

Alison Diamond
Chair, ALES