Instructor: Debra J. Rog, PhD An EA offers an opportunity to determine if a program is ready for an evaluation, and if not, what can be done to improve its readiness. EA is one of the few systematic tools used for evaluation planning, helping ground the evaluation in the reality of the program, ensuring it is focused on the right questions, engaging interested parties in the process, and ensuring that the appropriate design is implemented at the right time in the program process. EA helps to focus evaluation on programs that are designed and implemented with plausibility to achieve their outcomes, and consequently, can provide for wiser investment and use of evaluation funding. In addition, beyond being used as a tool for assessing a program’s readiness for evaluation, EA can be used to help develop programs, select sites to use in multi-site evaluations, providing quick information on a program, and other purposes. Following this two-day course, students with the ability to conduct an EA on their own. The course includes hands-on learning through the incorporation of an exercise following each step of the methods. Having conducted over 100 EAs, Dr. Rog will draw upon her experiences and examples to bring the method to life as the class learns the steps to designing the EA, implementing it, and analyzing and reporting the results. Recommended Audience: This course is suitable for new and experienced evaluators responsible for evaluating programs and initiatives. TEI Certificate: This course fulfills the following requirements: - Evaluation Practice & Inquiry elective for the Certificate in Evaluation Practice (CEP) - Evaluative Inquiry course for the Certificate in Advanced Evaluation Practices (CAEP)