9.1 Why monitor and evaluate?
Monitoring means keeping records of different resource centre
activities. Evaluation means using these records and other information,
such as user surveys and focus group discussions, to review
performance at set intervals and identify ways to improve the
resource centre and its services.
Evaluating resource centre activities enables the parent organisation
or donors to know how useful the activities are. Donors usually
expect to receive an evaluation report at set intervals, such
as every three years or at the end of a project or programme
phase. Parent organisations should also receive evaluation results,
to demonstrate how well the resource centre is helping the organisation
to fulfil its mission.
Evaluations can vary greatly in scale and style. An evaluation
might cover the whole range of resource centre activities, or
it might focus on an individual activity, such as the enquiry
service. The evaluation process - analysing data, drawing conclusions
and making recommendations - might take more than a week or
it might take less than a day.
Collecting and analysing data might involve an outside evaluator,
such as a representative of a donor agency, and/or the evaluation
might be a ‘participatory evaluation’ involving
resource centre staff and users. Participatory evaluation provides
an excellent opportunity for staff to learn from their experiences
and contribute to the continuing development of the resource
centre.
Evaluation requires a combination of ‘quantitative’
and ‘qualitative’ data:
- Quantitative data is data that can be measured, such as the
number of visitors, the number of written and telephone enquiries,
the number of searches carried out by staff, the number of subjects
requested, or the number of sources used to provide information
requested. Quantitative data is collected through monitoring
(see Section 9.2).
- Qualitative data is data that cannot be measured, such as
users’ opinions about the resource centre, and how they
have used information obtained from the resource centre. Qualitative
data is collected through questionnaires, interviews and focus
group discussions (see Section 9.3).
next: 9.2 monitoring
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