ben gammon consulting different perspectives on evaluation what it is why it is needed how it should...

Ben Gammon Consulting

Different perspectives on evaluation

What it is

Why it is needed

How it should be done


One perspective

• Teaching a pig to sing?

• Evaluation– costs money– needs staff – takes up time – annoys colleagues

• So why bother?


Why bother?

• The ultimate root is the desire to improve

• But whose desire is this?

• And what is to be improved?

• Two different perspectives


Funders ask for evaluation to be done

To assess impact of a project

So they can make better funding decisions in future


Practitioners do evaluation

To ‘prove’ impact of a project




To meet funders’ needs

And so they can support future funding bids

To sustain impact




To meet funders’ needs

And support future bids

And to improve practice

So as to increase impact

To sustain impact


Impact plus

• Evidence of impact only tells you part of the story– Whether something works / doesn’t work

• You also need to know where, when, why, how …– So you can sustain, increase or fix it


Evaluation needs to study impact and process of learning


Why you need to look at process?

• It’s about perspectives

• You cannot think & act like a visitor

• Impact is not guaranteed

• Need to understand visitors’ changing wants, motivations, prior attitudes & knowledge


Visitors’ motivations

• Heavily influence what impact is achieved E.g. Pekarik et al.(1999)– Object-centred– Information– Social– Introspective

• Object & Information; Social & Introspective motivations often in conflict


Visitors’ attitudes

• Often match those of exhibit developers– Makes changing attitudes very difficult

• Attitudes consist of beliefs, opinions & values (Worcester 2006)– Values are very hard to change

• The problem of the deficit model – False assumption that increasing knowledge

leads to increased support


Visitors’ entry narratives

• Entry narratives– How visitors construe & contemplate the world– What they know about the subject– Personal experience & memories

• Visitors perceive what they expect to see– Rather than what the exhibition team wanted

them to perceive


Another perspective

The need to look for failure


Barriers to learning & engagement

• Physical– Visitors cannot do, see, hear or reach something

• Intellectual– Visitors cannot understand what to do– Activity is too challenging– Activity is too easy

• Motivation– It’s boring– Takes too long– Too obvious– It’s not relevant to them


Effective evaluation

• Tells you what worked & what didn’t• AND why it worked / didn’t work• Looks at the process of learning as well as

outcomes • Good evaluation leads to change

– Feeds into future practice


The singing pig

• Successful evaluation• Helps funders make better

decisions• Helps you raise money• And improves practice

– Better exhibits, programmes, web-sites

– Happier visitors – More effective use of money– Happier funders

ben gammon consulting different perspectives on evaluation what it is why it is needed how it should...

Documents

ben gammon consulting

impact slide

ben gammon consulting

ben gammon consulting

future slide

conflict slide

failure slide

future practice slide