Local Evaluation of Children's Services Learning from the Children's ...

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Independent, balanced accounts of partnerships’ activitiesRelatively few reports explicitly stated that a key principle of the evaluation was itsindependence. One report, for example, indicated that it offered an independent,outsider’s view and hence offered perspectives that practitioners may not have. Anumber of reports indicated that it was their intention to generate learning from boththe successes as well as the failures of a partnership and its projects, and to highlightboth intended and unintended consequences of partnerships’ work. Some reportsstated that they had adopted a ‘critical friend’ stance in their relations withpartnerships; that negative comments were seen as assisting partnerships toimprove practice rather than as a judgement of poor performance. For example, anevaluation report of a Wave One partnership states: ‘Negative comments, where theyare given, are intended to be constructive – in the spirit of the “critical friend”’. Manylocal evaluation reports included some criticism of the progress of programmes,offering explanations as to why progress had been slow, proposing possible solutionsto bring about future improvements. Where the role of critical friend appeared to workmost successfully was where local evaluators were sensitive to the complex policyenvironments programmes were operating within, and where key members of theChildren’s Fund programme were receptive to the benefits of critical appraisal andprepared to use those findings to bring about improvements.A number of evaluators described the potential problems of balancing the intention ofbeing responsive to the needs of partnerships, and maintaining their independence.An evaluator of a Wave Two partnership indicated that whilst she felt the evaluationwas in principle relatively independent: I think [there was] minimal input from thepartnership board as well, because then it gets very political and agenda-driven. AndI didn’t feel that phase two [project evaluation] was that way, there had been somedifficulties in managing this independence in practice in terms of providing messagesthat the partnership board required of the evaluation:… as an independent evaluator, it’s all great and well, wonderful words andeverything, but actually some people don’t understand that. They still think thatyou’re paid by the Children's Fund therefore you will find what they want. Andsometimes the partnership board think, well we pay for you, so you will findwhat we want you to find, in the way that we want you to find it right.Some reports also stressed the importance of evaluation work being open tochallenge or correction by partnerships, indeed, the stage at which an evaluationengages with a partnership is important in terms of how definitive findings areexpected to be. Some reports, particularly early and interim reports, for example,Chapter 1 15
acknowledge that findings presented should be considered provisional, and thatmore definitive conclusions are expected in later reports. Some evaluations aretaking steps to confirm and verify evaluation findings through means such asestablishing reference groups of strategic partners and children and young peoplethat review and comment on material generated by the evaluation.Inclusive to different groups of stakeholdersMost evaluators stated that they were drawing on the voices of different stakeholdersto comment on different aspects of a partnership’s work. Such stakeholders includeprogramme managers and members of Children’s Fund staff, both statutory and VSCrepresentatives of partnership boards and other decision making structures, serviceproviders, and importantly children and young people and parents and carers whoare engaged in Children’s Fund activities. It is also recognised that it is important toensure that all participants in an evaluation receive effective feedback (see Chapter 3of this report). As suggested in a Wave Three partnership evaluation report, it isimportant to take an inclusive approach: So people feel involved in the evaluationprocess not subject to it. A small number of reports state that evaluations seek tobalance the interests of various stakeholder groups, rather than seek to support anyone group of stakeholders. As a local evaluation report of a Wave One partnershipstates:The approach taken in the design, implementation and reporting of thisevaluation is that of a public interest rather than ‘partisan’ evaluation. Itaddresses itself primarily to the work that has been done in relation to thestated aims and objectives of the…Children’s Fund. Its role is neither toadvocate for any one group or organisation, nor to arbitrate within or betweenthem.Other evaluations have adopted inclusive and participative approaches, aiming toinvolve children and young people, parents and carers in the evaluation designand/or its practice, as well as interview/questionnaire/focus group respondents. Forexample, the specific aim stated by a Wave One local evaluator was to empowerthose potentially benefiting from the Children’s Fund by eliciting their experiences ofChildren’s Fund services:We chose to focus on stakeholders like children and their carers due to the factthat they are the direct users of the Children’s Fund projects. Here we intend toempower the beneficiaries of the Children’s Fund by giving them a chance toexpress their views on ‘what works’ and ‘what doesn’t’ regarding the projectsthat they have been taking part in.16Chapter 1
Page 1 and 2: RESEARCHLocal Evaluation ofChildren
Page 4 and 5: When citing this report please show
Page 6 and 7: ContentsExecutive SummaryIIntroduct
Page 8 and 9: Local Evaluation of the Children’
Page 10 and 11: 10. Local evaluators highlighted th
Page 12 and 13: 20. Some evaluators involved childr
Page 14 and 15: successes of partnerships’ work (
Page 16: 38. Conditions reinforcing effectiv
Page 19 and 20: Children’s Fund initiative, namel
Page 21 and 22: engaging with policy makers, practi
Page 23 and 24: starting points and timetables of d
Page 25 and 26: 1. Process evaluation: critical ass
Page 27 and 28: time commitments and pressures amon
Page 29 and 30: tantamount to auditing when origina
Page 31: to a certain extent, because I was
Page 35 and 36: methods that were seen as being app
Page 38 and 39: Chapter 2: Methods Adopted by Child
Page 40 and 41: place. In one Wave One evaluation t
Page 42 and 43: provided by projects weakened the a
Page 44 and 45: confidently attribute any trends in
Page 46 and 47: A Wave Two evaluation report descri
Page 48 and 49: • Recruitment of the researcher:
Page 50 and 51: drawn on by evaluators include semi
Page 52 and 53: Chapter 3: How Local Evaluation Sup
Page 54 and 55: participation and work towards the
Page 56 and 57: highlighted in Table 1). These incl
Page 58 and 59: of had an impact. So we used a case
Page 60 and 61: Similarly an evaluator of a Wave Tw
Page 62 and 63: Evaluators sometimes struggled to a
Page 64: 6. A number of factors inhibit eval
Page 67 and 68: A number of evaluations described h
Page 69 and 70: 4.2 Key Messages from Local Evaluat
Page 71 and 72: for staff, typically dedicated part
Page 73 and 74: Where partnership working was descr
Page 75 and 76: strategic changes in children’s s
Page 77 and 78: 9. Evaluators reported that some co
Page 79 and 80: The importance of providing finding
Page 81 and 82: National Evaluation of the Children

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