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WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO EVALUATE CONFERENCES?

GENEVA EVALUATION NETWORK WORKSHOP CONFERENCE EVALUATION Organized by Laetitia Lienart & Glenn O’Neil Geneva, 16 March 2011. WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO EVALUATE CONFERENCES?. WHAT ARE THE OBJECTIVES OF CONFERENCE EVALUATIONS?. RELEVANT DATA COLLECTION METHODS.

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WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO EVALUATE CONFERENCES?

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  1. GENEVA EVALUATION NETWORKWORKSHOPCONFERENCE EVALUATIONOrganized by Laetitia Lienart & Glenn O’NeilGeneva, 16 March 2011

  2. WHY IS IT IMPORTANT TO EVALUATE CONFERENCES?

  3. WHAT ARE THE OBJECTIVES OF CONFERENCE EVALUATIONS?

  4. RELEVANT DATA COLLECTION METHODS • Face-to-face or phone individual interviews (structured & semi-structured) • Focus group interviews • Online surveys • Printed surveys • Structured observations of key sessions and conference areas • Review of conference programme and online resources • Review of statistical data on conference registration, scholarship recipients, abstracts, etc • Review of statistical data and evaluation findings from previous conference to allow comparison over time

  5. RELEVANT DATA COLLECTION METHODS (cont.) • Use of rapporteurs to follow sessions addressing key topics. Their feedback can be also used to measure some indicators (e.g. number of sessions presenting new findings). • Use of conference “instant” feedback systems. • Use of network analysis and mapping. • Analysis of the conference media coverage. • Review of posts and comments left by delegates and non-attendees on the conference blog, Facebook page and Twitter.

  6. Focus on IMPACT ASSESSMENT • Assessing conference impact(s) is feasible but needs to be planned and budgeted for at the planning stage (incl. in ToRs) • Methods: follow-up survey (online/face-to-face), action plans Ex: AIDS 2008 follow-up survey (1,5 year after) • 1,195 AIDS 2008 delegates completed the survey • About 2/3 had learnt something new and had changed some aspects of their work practice thanks to the new knowledge gained at the conference • Almost half reported that AIDS 2008 had directly influenced their organizations’ HIV work • Almost 4 in 10 were aware of AIDS 2008’s influences on HIV work, policies or advocacy in their countries • 75% had kept in contact with at least 1 person met at AIDS 2008, mainly to exchange knowledge, lessons learnt and/or suggested solutions (86%)

  7. USE OF EVALUATION FINDINGS • Evaluation findings should be “very usable” as conferences are often repeated annually or bi-annually. • Importance of “buy-in” of conference organizers. • Sharing of evaluation plan with conference organizers and committees/working groups*. • Evaluation reports: the quality of content and format is crucial to attract readers and convince them that evaluation results are reliable and useable. • Dissemination of evaluation results: timely, use a variety of channels depending on the target audience. • Use of follow-up mechanisms** with conference organizers and relevant stakeholders. • Review progress on evaluation findings in the lead-up to the next conference.

  8. KEY LESSONS LEARNT

  9. Further information Proceedings (slides & handouts) of a 1-day workshop on conference evaluation held in Nov 2010 are available on request (email Laetitia.Lienart@iasociety.org) Feel free to join the Conference Evaluation Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/conference_evaluation Glenn’s blog has more resources on conference evaluation, see category “event evaluation:http://intelligentmeasurement.wordpress.com/category/event-evaluation/

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