Evaluating Federal Social Programs

Monograph on the evaluation of social policy programmes in the USA - discusses the application of evaluation techniques and the use of evaluation within the institutional framework (legislative and executive branches), with particular reference to the hew department and the labour administration. References.

USA. Research results of a study of the federal system for the evaluation of social policy programmes - distinguishes four types of evaluation, viz. Programme impact, programme strategy, project evaluation and project rating, covers administrative aspects, organizational relationships between national level and local level, financial aspects and personneling, evaluation techniques, etc., and includes recommendations. Bibliography pp. 121 to 134.

In October 2016, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened a 1-day public workshop on Principles and Practices for Federal Program Evaluation. The workshop was organized to consider ways to bolster the integrity and protect the objectivity of the evaluation function in federal agenciesâ€"a process that is essential for evidence-based policy making. This publication summarizes the presentations and discussions from the workshop.

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996 fundamentally changed the nation's social welfare system, replacing a federal entitlement program for low-income families, called Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), with state-administered block grants, the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. PRWORA furthered a trend started earlier in the decade under so called "waiver" programs-state experiments with different types of AFDC rules-toward devolution of design and control of social welfare programs from the federal government to the states. The legislation imposed several new, major requirements on state use of federal welfare funds but otherwise freed states to reconfigure their programs as they want. The underlying goal of the legislation is to decrease dependence on welfare and increase the self-sufficiency of poor families in the United States. In summer 1998, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) of the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) asked the Committee on National Statistics of the National Research Council to convene a Panel on Data and Methods for Measuring the Effects of Changes in Social Welfare Programs. The panel's overall charge is to study and make recommendations on the best strategies for evaluating the effects of PRWORA and other welfare reforms and to make recommendations on data needs for conducting useful evaluations. This interim report presents the panel's initial conclusions and recommendations. Given the short length of time the panel has been in existence, this report necessarily treats many issues in much less depth than they will be treated in the final report. The report has an immediate short-run goal of providing DHHS-ASPE with recommendations regarding some of its current projects, particularly those recently funded to study "welfare leavers"-former welfare recipients who have left the welfare rolls as part of the recent decline in welfare caseloads.

"Evaluation has rapidly developed into an exciting inter-disciplinary academic and applied research field. Indications are that this specialty will continue to expand and become more rigorous and demanding. Vast numbers of fields (and different methodologies) are using evaluation research techniques now. Yet, relatively little attention has been paid to the consequences of systematic evaluation practice-particularly as it affects the development (and, in some cases, continued existence) of numerous social programs. The Evaluation of Social Programs addresses these questions. It is a unique book-offering up-to-date views of experts drawn from government, universities, charitable foundations, and independent research organizations who are leading practitioners or consumers of social programs research" -- Dust jacket.

Addressing an issue of burning interest to every taxpayer, a Heritage Foundation scholar brings objective analysis to bear as he responds to the important—and provocative—question posed by his book's title. Of course, the answer to that question will also help determine whether the American public should fear budget cuts to federal social programs. Readers, says author David B. Muhlhausen, can rest easy. As his book decisively demonstrates, scientifically rigorous national studies almost unanimously find that the federal government fails to solve social problems. To prove his point, Muhlhausen reports on large-scale evaluations of social programs for children, families, and workers, some advocated by Democrats, some by Republicans. But it isn't just the results that matter. It's the lesson to readers on how Americans can—and should—accurately assess government programs that cost hundreds of billions of dollars each year. At the book's core is an insistence that we move beyond anecdotal reasoning and often-partisan opinion to measure the effectiveness of social programs using objective analysis and scientific methods. At the very least, the results of such analysis will, like this book, provide a sound basis for much-needed public debate.

Explains how to analyze social policy and programs and how to design new programs or evaluate and improve existing ones. Analysis, evaluation and design of social policy and programs. Students of Social Work Policy or Social Work practitioners interested in learning more about the analysis, evaluation and design of social policy and programs.

This book appears at an opportune time in the history of evaluation. Its detailed and up-to-date account of the organization and use of evaluation in eight Western, democratic countries—Canada, Germany, United Kingdom, United States, Denmark, Holland, Norway, and Switzerland—shows how evaluation functions at different levels of development. Focusing on the national or federal level of government, this volume presents a systematic and comparative view of eight nations at different stages of the development, institutionalization, and utilization of evaluations. All of these original contributions have been written by academics and government officials involved in the production and use of evaluation findings. Each shows how their respective country has moved to institutionalize evaluation at the federal level, and each explores the reasons for that institutionalization. Among them are managerial accountability, the increased complexity of the decisions facing policymakers, federally sponsored social change that needs to be tracked and assessed, and the increasing recognition that political power comes to those who possess such information. Program Evaluation and the Management of Government is tightly integrated. The contributions share coherence, a common analytic framework and use of key terms, resulting from the authors’ three-year dialogue as members of the Working Group on Policy and Program Evaluation sponsored by the International Institute for Administrative Sciences located in Belgium. Their shared commitment to working together has given us the first systematic effort to assess evaluation across such a large number of countries. It will be of interest to applied social scientists and policymakers, especially those interested in comparative research.