Transformative perspective
Back to the principles’ overview
Transformative perspective: Co-evaluation moves away from the traditional concept of evaluation as a neutral observation towards a collaborative effort of documenting and interpreting project achievements for social change. It puts a specific focus on the collective identification of lessons learned, potential transformational opportunities or new practices for participants (personal transformation) and society at large (social transformation).
Recommendations:
- Critically consider the timeframe of your project and make sure that the insights generated during the co-evaluation are communicated regularly and reflected in the overall management of the project.
- It is important to trigger the process of translating results into practice as early as possible. Consider relating to the expertise of actors from CSOs and establish connections early in the project.
- For a potential uptake of project results at socio-political level it is likewise important to engage any decision makers and policy makers early on in the process.
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What steps or actions could be taken to ensure these principles are widely adopted and implemented in future projects?
I think the focus on power is so important, particularly when working with young people, and the power balances that…
I like the suggestion from PB of adaptive and early engagement. From my own experience, gaining ethical approval for a…
It is great when participants take ownership of the projects they are involved in, but does this reduce from the…
It seems to me that this principle embodies the essence of co-evaluation. Which is an action taken in order to…
This is a really important one, but perhaps also the hardest to achieve. Those marginalized perspectives are often the ones…
Being open and transparent is key in my opinion for any successful project. I would add a recommendation to include…
Thank you for organizing this consultation. It is a demonstration that you practice what you preach 🙂 This principle is…
Forms and protocols for informed consent and similar need to be adapted for clearance from the part of ethic committees…
It is important that the extra time required is factored-in from start. Otherwise it may come as a surprise and…
With regards to this and all other principles, aspects of ethics and responsibility in all the research steps, must be…
OK with the principle. In the recommendations, I thinks “reflexivity” should be stressed more. E.g. Not only flexibility, but also…
To this I would like to add the concept of the evaluation champions/leaders/ambassadors (you can name it as you like).…
regarding this principle, I would foremost add the need to increase awareness about best practices related to personal data, e.g.…
I agree will all things mentioned under this principle. I would supplement with the need to communicate clearly and in…
I really like this one, but I would add some recommendations regarding the “letting go” of ownership from scientists or…
I love this one, super important. No comments.
I think this principle is the more specific to co-evaluation, while the rest could be standard principles for participatory research.…
I think this one is also very important, but I miss more recommendations about the empowerment aspect and how co-evaluation…
I like this one very much, and it’s already core to citizen science so it should definitively be part of…
I think this principle is the more specific to co-evaluation, while the rest could be standard principles for participatory research. So I like that you propose to step back from standard “objective” evaluation procedures. But then I don’t understand why in the recommendations you go back to talking about timing (wasn’t this covered by principle 1?), and don’t talk about steps towards this “positional” evaluation, like abandoning the idea of single external experts that make an evaluation, or using alternative methods than standard evaluation questionnaires, or making sure the evaluation is transformative (a.k.a empowering and actionable?). Maybe you can bring here the recommendations on empowerment from the previous principle and avoid repeating recommendations about timing?
It seems to me that this principle embodies the essence of co-evaluation. Which is an action taken in order to make change. This needs to be embraced by all partners as change is ongoing. Its not easy to manage a project while it is changing constantly, and I wonder if any recommendations can address this issue?