Human Service Program

Human Services Program

Ways in which the agency could have prevented this situation

The agency could have prevented this situation by staying in continuous touch with the feds. In practice, this would have been possible by continuously relaying information regarding the agency's progress to the feds. This would have helped by having two effects. For one, it would have indirectly kept the feds aware of the type of information that the agency was collecting. In the current scenario, the agency and the feds were clearly not on the same frequency regarding the progress of the agency. If the agency had remained in continuous communication with the feds, it would have allowed the feds to remain reassured of the agency's progress and as a result, the feds would not have felt the need to send an evaluator in the first place. In fact, even if the feds did demand the agency to record certain data types, continuous agency on the agency's part would have provoked the feds to direct the agency regarding their recording of data.

The apparent scope and purpose of the federal evaluation

The apparent scope and purpose of the federal evaluation is clearly based on the objective to collect information regarding the viewership of the shows produced by the agency. The data required by the federal evaluation shows that the feds are not aiming to evaluate the agency, but are more interested in the viewership of the agency's work. This is apparent through the fact that the agency is looking for data regarding viewership demographics instead of viewership opinions.

The reason for the development of this situation

The reason for the development of this situation appears to be a shortfall on the part of both: the agency and the feds. For one, the feds, when delivering their funding should have clearly stated their desired outcomes so that the agency could have strived to ensure that the objectives were met. Considering the current scenario, it is clear that neither the feds nor the agency gave much consideration to the rationale behind the funding in the initial stages. The mistake on the agency's part is that they did not report periodically to the feds. Had they taken a pro-active approach, it would have helped avoid the current situation.

Relevance of scope and purpose in designing an evaluation

The relevance of scope and purpose in designing an evaluation is incorporated in the fact that the scope of the ...