Research Elements The following are some issues that have been raised so far during my research.
Process or Product? As community musicians are we being asked to evaluate the process that the participants have gone through during the life time of the project or are we only being asked to evaluate the eventual outcome or long term effects of the project. Should there be more of a focus on the process in what funders want evaluated. Is it just easier to evaluate the product i.e. a final performance or how many participants keep making music after the completion of the project? This is linked to when an evaluation takes place. Do you do continous evaluation which includes reviews at each stage focusing on the process or should we only be concerned with what the project finally achieves?
Names or Numbers? Is there a use in the evaluation of a community music project for qualitative or anacdotal eveidence or should we be trying to qualify, with numbers, our success? Do we feel pressured into providing funders and large organisations with sets of numbers that sum up our work i.e. how many participants etc? Would we rather be providing evidence that the participants have grown and developed and achieved something personally? How can we then proove this in an evaluation and present the findings?
Tell a Story or make judgments? How many evaluation reports simply tell the story of what happened in a project and how many actually place value by judging the outcomes? Are we loath the pass judgement on our own work (i.e. as leaders) as much as we are loath to judge the work of the participants? Many evaluation reports include descritions of events and quotes from participants and other 'stakeholders' but without judgements how can the evaluation be used to improve practice?
Why evaluate anyway? Who wants us to evaluate? Do we want to do it? if so, why? Are we mearly fulfilling the requirements of the people funding the project? If so, what would we like to evaluate or would we not bother?
If you have any views of comments on the above issues then please do email me personally or discuss them on the mailing list (to join find a link on the front page of this site)