Evaluating ICT for Education in Africa - Royal Holloway, University of ...

„These focus groups are so much better than the feedback weused to collect from the teachers – that was a completemockery – we were never going to get anywhere with that.‟In conversation with Tilahun and Ayele following a day of meetings withteachers at Rema (22/04/08) we reflected on the challenges of stakeholdersengaging with the evaluation of the monitoring and evaluation process. Putsimply, our discussion was a review of the process of evaluating themonitoring and evaluation. They highlighted that asking the teachers toparticipate at this level by reflecting on the suitability of a focus group design,although laudable, was not likely to be helpful because as Tilahun expressed(22/04/08):„When you ask them about focus group design it is difficult forthem because they can‟t really think about how to improve thedesign – because this is all they have seen!‟Despite the challenge of asking participants to reflect on the suitability of thefocus group design and format, Everts noted that the focus groupenvironment in Ethiopia created a relaxed dynamic amongst the teachers andthat they responded more openly than when in individual conversation. Hesuggested (08/02/08) that this was because when speaking individually:„Maybe they felt more singled out, had to justify anything theysaid, they felt under pressure. The focus group environmentwas far more conducive to getting information from them - itwas relaxed and more jovial.‟At the close of the fieldwork, Everts (17/12/08) concluded that the focusgroups had been the strongest single method for monitoring and evaluationbecause of their flexibility and ability to progress conversation beyond whathe perceived as the pre-programmed answers:„The flexibility allows you to go beyond the answer that theythink you want to hear. There is a great potential dynamicbetween the participants – one idea sprouts into another and172