This book looks back at the origins of program evaluation. By summarizing, comparing, and contrasting the work of seven major theorists of program evaluation, it provides an important perspective on the current state of evaluation theory and provides suggestions for improving its practice.

Sections include: experiments and generalised causal inference; statistical conclusion validity and internal validity; construct validity and external validity; quasi-experimental designs that either lack a control group or lack pretest observations on the outcome; quasi-experimental designs that use both control groups and pretests; quasi-experiments: interrupted time-series designs; regresssion discontinuity designs; randomised experiments: rationale, designs, and conditions conducive to doing them; practical problems 1: ethics, participation recruitment and random assignment; practical problems 2: treatment implementation and attrition; generalised causal inference: a grounded theory; generalised causal inference: methods for single studies; generalised causal inference: methods for multiple studies; a critical assessment of our assumptions.

This book presents some quasi-experimental designs and design features that can be used in many social research settings. The designs serve to probe causal hypotheses about a wide variety of substantive issues in both basic and applied research. Each design is assessed in terms of four types of validity, with special stress on internal validity. Although general conclusions are drawn about the strengths and limitations of each design, emphasis is also placed on the fact that the relevant threats to valid inference are specific to each research setting. Consequently, a threat that is usually associated with a particular design need not invariably be associated with that design.

One of the myths about families in inner-city neighborhoods is that they are characterized by poor parenting. Sociologist Frank Furstenberg and his colleagues explode this and other misconceptions about success, parenting, and socioeconomic advantage in Managing to Make It. This unique study—the first in the MacArthur Foundation Studies on Successful Adolescent Development series—focuses on how and why youth are able to overcome social disadvantages. Based on nearly 500 interviews and case studies of families in inner-city Philadelphia, Managing to Make It lays out in detail the creative means parents use to manage risks and opportunities in their communities. More importantly, it also depicts the strategies parents develop to steer their children away from risk and toward resources that foster positive development and lead to success. "Indispensible to anyone concerned about breaking the cycle of poverty and helplessness among at-risk adolescents, this book has a readable, graphic style easily grasped by those unfamiliar with statistical techniques." —Library Journal

In the course of its television lifetime, "Sesame Street" has taught alphabet-related skills to hundreds of thousands of preschool children. But the program may have attracted more of its regular viewers from relatively affluent homes in which the parents were better educated. Analyzing and reevaluating data drawn from several sources, principally the Educational Testing Service's evaluations of "Sesame Street," the authors of this book open fresh lines of inquiry into how much economically disadvantaged children learned from viewing the series for six months and into whether the program is widening the gap that separates the academic achievement of disadvantaged preschoolers from that of their more affluent counterparts. The authors define as acute dilemma currently facing educational policymakers: what positive results are achieved when a large number of children learn some skills at a younger age if this absolute increase in knowledge is associated with an increase in the difference between social groups?

Meta-Analysis for Explanation brings exemplary illustrations of research synthesis together with expert discussion of the use of meta-analytic techniques. Four meta-analyses prepared by Betsy Jane Becker, Elizabeth C. Devine, Mark W. Lipsey, and William R. Shadish reflect the variety of techniques available to quantitative reviewers. Framing these, chapters written by the authors offer a general overview of the field and a discussion of the scientific value of meta-analysis.

Es considerable el desacuerdo existente en la adecuación de los diversos métodos para realizar la investigación evaluativa. Uno de los debates actuales, de intensidad creciente, se centra en la diferencia que existe entre los métodos cualitativos y cuantitativos. La polémica, sin embargo, no es nueva y son frecuentes las discusiones planteadas en términos dicotómicos y, a veces, antagónicos entre las dos perspectivas básicas. COOK y REICHARDT ofrecen en la presente obra, como objetivo fundamental, un completo panorama de estos dos tipos de métodos, en un afán por buscar sus compatibilidades y complementariedad, lo cual constituye, hoy día, el punto de vista más actual y novedoso dentro de este tradicional desequilibrio entre las dos tendencias.

Una historia, inquietante que se extiende desde un oscuro secreto del pasado hasta una demoledora revelacion en el presente. Un dia de verano, la nueva profesora de arte de la escuela de Chatham llego al pueblo. Se instalo en una casa aislada junto a las oscuras aguas de la Laguna Negra. Con su llegada comenzo una imprevisible cadena de sucesos que cambiaria para siempre la tranquila vida del pueblo. Ahora, anos mas tarde, solo una persona viva conoce la respuesta a la pregunta que destruyo irrevocablemente toda una manera de vivir: Que ocurrio realmente aquel dia en la Laguna Negra?