NON-PROFIT AND GRANTS:CAREEN AND COUNSELING

Non-Profit and Grants:CAreen And Counseling



Non-Profit and Grants:CAreen And Counseling

Introduction

Conclusion

NON-PROFIT AND GRANTS

Non-Profit and Grants

Non-Profit and Grants

Introduction

As public communication campaigns grow more sophisticated and strategic, evaluation is not keeping pace with their innovation. While funders are asking for more information on results, evaluators are grappling with how to make their way in this developing and challenging field. They are trying to understand the strategies and theories that guide campaigns and how to choose the right outcomes and methods to assess them (Harrow, 2005).

Non-Profit and Grants

Public communication campaigns use the media, messaging, and an organized set of communication activities to generate specific outcomes in a large number of individuals and in a specified period of time. They are an attempt to shape behavior toward desirable social outcomes. To maximize their chances of success, campaigns usually coordinate media efforts with a mix of other interpersonal and community-based communication channels. There are two main types of campaigns: (Harrow, 2005).

1) Individual behavior change campaigns that try to change in individuals the behaviors that lead to social problems or promote behaviors that lead to improved individual or social well-being; and

2) Public will campaigns that attempt to mobilize public action for policy change. Public will campaigns are less understood, but are increasing rapidly in number.

A. Challenges and Stumbling Blocks - Public communication campaigns are difficult to evaluate because: 1) they have horizontal and vertical complexity; 2) their interventions are unpredictable; 3) context and other factors confound outcomes; 3) control or comparison groups are difficult to create; 4) there is a lack of knowledge and precision about outcomes, and 5) evaluators lack the necessary tools (HEFCE, 2001).

There are four basic types of evaluation - formative, process, outcome, and impact. Formative is referred to as “front end” evaluation; process, outcome, and impact make up “back end” evaluation. Front-end evaluation of campaigns is more advanced than back-end evaluation. There is not complete agreement about the state of the campaign evaluation field and what direction it should take in the future. Those who subscribe to the causal paradigm feel the field is in need of more outcome and impact evaluation and should use rigorous methodology to deliver definitive answers about what works and whether the campaign caused its intended effects. Those who subscribe to the social change paradigm feel that evaluation should be more practical and process-oriented, delivering information that can be channeled quickly back into the campaign as it is implemented (HEFCE, 2001).

Public communication campaigns are growing more sophisticated and strategic. While there is still much progress to be made, campaign designers have begun to diversify their strategies and abandon the notion that information alone is the cure-all for society's behavioral ills. As a result, campaigns are decreasingly based only on the flawed notion that people will improve if they just know better. More campaigns are paying attention to context and linking their traditional media and behavior change strategies with on-the ground community action to make the social and ...