INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE: THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION

PARTICIPATORY EVALUATION:

A METHOD TO EMPOWER

COMMUNITIES

Xavier ÚcarPilar Pineda

Hector Nuñez

CONTENTS

• Social and territorial strategy which aims to give answers to the needs of the community, to improve quality of life.

• CDP’s enhance participatory processes, that facilitate the empowerment of the neighborhoods, districts, regions, organizations and citizenship.

• In 1996 the first two CDP’s were implemented in Catalonia. Now, there are 80 CDP’s.

• The Government of Catalonia collaborate with civic and social entities, and give institutional and economic support.

• It is the communities themselves which achieve social transformation

COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT PLANS

• To explore new models of evaluation for the CDP’s, to provide qualitative information

• To devise a Participatory Evaluation Framework Plan of the Communities Projects of Catalonia

GOALS

On the basis of the On the basis of the ParticipatoryParticipatory EvaluationEvaluation methodmethod

Experts and non-experts working together in the activities necessary to generate a shared evaluative knowledge of the actions in which they participate, or from whose results the could be affected. Cousins, 2003

METHOD (I)

Uniform methodologies are not realistic, given the diversity in the communities Fetterman & Wandersman, 2007

We designed general operating guidelines for PE, which had to be adapted to the reality of each community.

First phase First phase (2008)

-Developed by a working team: technicians of the Catalan Government, community technicians, and researchers of the UAB

- Preparatory work: analysis of 55 evaluation reports of CDP’s

- Participatory design: placing the participants in the PE Framework Plan and make them aware of their role as main actors

METHOD (II)

Second phase Second phase (2010)

-Expansion of the research team: universities of Barcelona and Girona, and the foundation Citilab.

-An R+D+I project was presented to the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, to apply the strategy of PE in the evaluation of CDP’s in Catalonia, trough a methodology of case studies.

In this first year, our work has concentrated on:

Theoretical-practical groundwork

•Bibliographical review and analysis

Methodological and instrumental design

•Creating a database of experiences of PE•Creating a theoretical framework•Constructing a set of indicators of empowerment•Building a web portal of the project•Reviewing variables and indicators•Preparing entry into the different territories

• To show the usefulness of PE and to improve the CDP evaluated.

• Personal and community empowerment of the actors involved in the PE process. In particular, we aim to achieve:– Acquisition of new values, tools, attitudes and knowledge

on behalf of the community members.– Handing over of responsibility and control– Analysis, reflection and resolution of people’s situations

and problems in the community– Interiorization of attitudes of change

EXPECTED RESULTS

Thanks for your attention

xavier.ucar@uab.es