Evaluation is a burgeoning field and remains fairly young by most standards. Within Cooperative Extension, evaluation practices have been implemented at a variety of levels given that evaluation is mandatory for much of the funding Cooperative Extension receives. With evaluation in high demand, it is expected that most Extension educators are performing some levels of evaluation as a routine part of their jobs. In order to perform the required evaluations, an Extension educator must exhibit some level of knowledge and skill regarding evaluation. While much research to date has been done on the level of evaluation within the organization, there is a lack of understanding regarding the evaluation competencies that Extension educators must possess and the culture of evaluation within the organization. This study set out to examine the evaluation competencies, culture, and evaluation behaviors within Cooperative Extension. Utilizing an online survey format and quantitative methodology, a widely accepted set of evaluation competencies were examined for their importance within Cooperative Extension. A panel of 13 experts was selected to examine the competencies and it was determined than all competencies in the list were necessary for Extension educators to exhibit in their jobs. The list of competencies was then combined with a subscale regarding culture and a subscale based on the Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen, 1991). A total of 419 Extension educators in four Extension systems participated in the study, with 222 generating usable data for a response rate of 13%. The highest and lowest skill level for the competencies were determined by Extension educators self-reporting. Perception of importance of each competency was examined and the highest and lowest importance rankings were determined. These were compared to the rankings of importance by the expert panel. A path analysis was conducted by modifying the Theory of Planned Behavior model and multiple regression analysis. Mean weighted discrepancy scores were calculated to determine the differences in skill level and perception for each of the competencies. The subscale of culture was examined for potential areas of Evaluation Capacity Building (ECB) within the organization. Results show that while there was much agreement between the expert panel and Extension educators regarding the importance of competencies, experts ranked all competencies as important while Extension educators did not. The results of the path analysis determined intention and perceived behavioral control explained 3.9% of the variance in the evaluation behavior exhibited by skill. Subjective norm and attitude explained 11.8% of the variance within intention. Perceived behavioral control, attitude and culture accounted for 13.1% of the variance in subjective norm. Culture and perception accounted for 7.1% of the variance in attitude. Perception, program area, college major, location, training in evaluation, degree level and years of experience explained 28% of the variance within evaluation culture. Finally, recommendations for practice and future research were made based on these findings. / Ph. D.

Family support programs serve vulnerable families by providing various forms of support, such as education, health services, financial assistance, and referrals to community resources. A major feature of evaluation involves assessing program effectiveness and learning from evaluation findings (Mertens and Wilson, 2012). Collaboration and cultural responsiveness are important topics in evaluation which remain largely distinct in the literature. However, evaluation capacity building provides a context for exploring possible intersections. Data about seven programs were collected via semi-structured interviews and document analysis. This study revealed that the program leaders feel that their programs are unique, complex, and misunderstood. The findings also suggest that program leaders believe that evaluation is important for program improvement and funding. Although participants did not anticipate evaluation capacity building and did not readily express a desire to develop their own evaluation skills, participants from all seven programs enthusiastically expressed interest in evaluation capacity building once explained. Although participants did not discuss cultural responsiveness as it relates to race, they expressed a need to overcome a community culture of reluctance to participate in programs and aversion to educational pursuits. Given the programs' shared population of interest, similar outcomes, and common challenges, evaluation capacity building in a group setting may give Roanoke family support program leaders the evaluation knowledge, skills, and peer support to engage in program evaluation that is both collaborative and culturally responsive. / Master of Science in Life Sciences

Program evaluation has become an increasingly urgent task for organizations, agencies, and initiatives that have the obligation or motivation to measure program outcomes, demonstrate impact, improve programming, tell their program story, and justify new or continued funding. Evaluation capacity building (ECB) is an important endeavor not only to empower program staff to understand, describe, and improve their programs, but also to enable programs to effectively manage limited resources. Accountability is important as public funds for social programs continue to dwindle and program administrators must do their best to fulfill their program missions in ethical, sustainable ways despite insufficient resources. While ECB on its own valuable, as it can promote evaluative thinking and help build staff's evaluation literacy and competency, ECB presents a ripe opportunity for program staff to understand the principles of equity and inclusivity and to see themselves as change agents for societal transformation. In the present study, I developed, tested, and evaluated the concept of transformative ECB (TECB), a social justice-oriented approach, rooted in culturally responsive evaluation, critical adult education, and the transformative paradigm, which promotes not only critical and evaluative thinking, but also kaleidoscopic thinking. Kaleidoscopic thinking (KT) is thinking that centers social justice and human dignity through intentional consideration (turning of the kaleidoscope) of multiple perspectives and contexts while attending to the intersectional planes of diversity, such as culture, race, gender identity, age, belief system, and socioeconomic status. KT involves reflexivity, creativity, respect for diversity, compassion and hope on the part of the thinker when examining issues and making decisions. / Doctor of Philosophy / Program evaluation has become increasingly important for organizations seeking to measure program outcomes, demonstrate impact, improve programming, tell their program story, and make the case for new or continued funding. Evaluation capacity building (ECB) includes training that is important not only to help program staff to understand, describe, and improve their programs, but also to allow programs to successfully "do more" with less. While ECB on its own is valuable, as it can help program staff become more evaluation-minded and skilled, ECB presents a ripe opportunity for program staff to understand the principles of equity and inclusivity and to see themselves as drivers of social change. In this study, I developed, tested, and evaluated the idea of transformative ECB (TECB), a social justice-oriented approach, rooted in culturally responsive evaluation, critical adult education, and the transformative (social justice-related) framework. The TECB approach promotes not only critical thinking and evaluative thinking, but also kaleidoscopic thinking, which focuses on social justice and human dignity. KT involves reflexivity, creativity, respect for diversity, compassion, and hope on the part of the thinker when examining issues and making decisions.

In The Gambia, financial sustainability and poverty alleviation have been largely based on the assumption that analysis of macro level growth will bridge the gap between the formal and informal sectors; alleviate poverty and exclusion, ignoring other important factors such as political, social, cultural and religious issues. The government, microfinance outlets and international development agencies have implemented many measures to bring the masses into the formal economy to no avail. This dissertation explores Reliance Financial Service and the role of the Osusus in poverty alleviation, and how the Osusus are the edifice of microfinance and economic sustainability in The Gambia. Firstly, Osusus are small microfinance groups where participants receive substantial amounts of money to meet planned heavy expenditure commitments. To put things into perspective, Osusu is one of the oldest community based microfinance institutions in The Gambia, it has mostly resisted formalization. It is a social and financial system, where members contribute a set sum of money each week or month that is then allocated to one member. This has given some women a degree of independence and solidarity. Secondly, despite women being the largest segment of the Gambian population, disparities in gender roles, illiteracy, high unemployment and the lack of mainstreaming the interest and needs of women in national policy and the system tends to leave many women economically disadvantaged. Hence, this dissertation found that the provision of microfinance services in the form of micro-credit, insurance and micro-savings could be a great sustainability tool to create equity, uplift the economic and social status of women in society. Also, women could use these services towards productive consumption such as feeding their families, sending their children to school, affording healthcare and engaging in productive economic activities to increase their income. Empirically, it examines the microfinance outlook in The Gambia, its impacts on socio-economics ramifications on the country. It also examines the role of microfinance, contextually Reliance Financial Services Kafoo scheme, as a viable alternative poverty-alleviation avenue. / Ph. D. / This study provides and posits microfinance as a sustainable economic development model, contending that microfinance can be a potent method in The Gambia when anchored in the Osusu system. Microfinance, however, is not a silver-bullet but if practiced within the structure of locally based institutions like Osusu – they could potentially move women and other rural Gambians out of poverty.

Since the inception of the National Skills Development Framework for Employees in Public Education in 2006, every organisation has its own WSP to offer skills development training to employees. This study aims to analyse the implementation challenges of the capacity building programme/s at head office of the Gauteng Department of Education. These programmes, including internships, workplace skills plan and short courses were explored from the circumstantial status at the national level (general) and will focus on the Gauteng Department of Education (specific context). In this context, the study sets out to explore the following specific problem exploring that there are challenges in the effective implementation of capacity-building programmes for job-related skills development of employees at Gauteng Department of Education at managerial levels. In the search for answers to the research problem, a hypothesis was formulated, and various primary and secondary sources were utilised. The findings from the literature review and empirical research undertaken in this study indicate that there are significant challenges to overcome in the effective implementation of capacity-building programmes. The study offers relevant recommendations to improve the challenges. / MA (Public Management and Administration), North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2014

Since the inception of the National Skills Development Framework for Employees in Public Education in 2006, every organisation has its own WSP to offer skills development training to employees. This study aims to analyse the implementation challenges of the capacity building programme/s at head office of the Gauteng Department of Education. These programmes, including internships, workplace skills plan and short courses were explored from the circumstantial status at the national level (general) and will focus on the Gauteng Department of Education (specific context). In this context, the study sets out to explore the following specific problem exploring that there are challenges in the effective implementation of capacity-building programmes for job-related skills development of employees at Gauteng Department of Education at managerial levels. In the search for answers to the research problem, a hypothesis was formulated, and various primary and secondary sources were utilised. The findings from the literature review and empirical research undertaken in this study indicate that there are significant challenges to overcome in the effective implementation of capacity-building programmes. The study offers relevant recommendations to improve the challenges. / MA (Public Management and Administration), North-West University, Vaal Triangle Campus, 2014

Many of the international, supranational, national, and grassroots development organizations working in the field of education channel their efforts into capacity-building for teachers. My research examines the nexus of such international development by US-based organizations with national schooling systems by naming and theorizing this process as a new field called cross-border teacher education. "Cross-border" is the term employed by UNESCO (2005) and OECD (2007) to describe international cooperative projects in higher education, synonymous with "transnational," "borderless," and "offshore" education (Knight, 2007). I use a critical lens to compare two distinct models of cross-border teacher education: a small locally based non-profit development organization in Guatemala that has worked with one school for several years, and a US government-funded program whose participants are trained in bilingual teaching methods and critical thinking at US colleges and universities, then return to their home communities throughout Mexico and Guatemala. These are programs for inservice teachers and are henceforth referred to as cross-border professional development or CBPD. The research questions for this study are: What institutions shape cross-border professional development in these cases? How are language policies enacted through CBPD? How do teachers make meaning of their CBPD experiences when they return to their classrooms and communities? And finally, What do these case studies tell us about cross-border professional development as a process? These questions generate understandings of national education systems, US-based international development, and cross-border education. Utilizing ethnographic approaches to educational policy that locate regional, class, and ethnic asymmetries (McCarty, 2011; Tollefson, 2002), data was gathered according to the distinct organizational structures of the two agencies. For the larger organization data collection was initiated with electronic open-ended questionnaires and supplemented by semi-structured interviews, classroom observations, and program documents. Data on the smaller organization was collected through participant observation in professional development workshops and classrooms, semi-structured interviews, and textual analysis of teacher reflections, organizational emails and documents. The research focuses on the voices of teachers as the target of cross-border professional development efforts, but also maps out the dialogic perspectives of education officials and the organizations‘ administrators to illuminate tensions within the process as well as highlights some surprising roles for teachers as agents of change.

Background: Due to various factors, such as the restructuring of the South African Police Service (SAPS) in 1996, Police Social Work Services decided to broaden the scope of its services by developing and introducing proactive personnel capacity building programmes (PCBP's). Fifteen PCB programmes had been developed by 1999, which gave rise to the need for a comprehensive impact assessment of these programmes. This resulted in the Evaluation of Personnel Capacity Building Programmes (EPCBP) research project that was launched in 2001. The evaluation of the Healthy Lifestyle and Coping with Change programmes formed part of this comprehensive study. Objectives: The primary aim of the study was to determine the effect of the Healthy Lifestyle (HLS) and Coping with Change (CWC) programmes on the knowledge, attitude and behaviour of SAPS personnel. Method: The comparison group pre-test and post-test design and triangulation were used during this research. Six measuring scales and a presenter's evaluation questionnaire were developed and completed by 196 (HLS) and 184 (CWC) experimental group respondents, 38 (HLS) and 41 (CWC) comparison group members and 10 (HLS) and 7 (CWC) presenters. Results: With the help of various measuring instruments and the triangulation of measurements, it was determined that the Healthy Lifestyle and Coping with Change programmes had a practical significant effect on the knowledge, attitude and behaviour of the respondents. It was concluded that these programmes were effective tools in the hands of Police Social Work Service (PSWS) because they not only empowered SAPS personnel to lead more productive professional lives, but also enhanced their personal well-being. / Thesis (M.A. (MW))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2006.

Lesotho is a country plagued by underdevelopment and poverty. This research is a case study of an indigenous community organisation in the northern district of Botha-Bothe in Lesotho. Boseele is a rural development organisation which attracted international donor investment in the aftermath of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project. The study aims at investigating the impact of capacity development processes on Boseele and its members. The study identified capacity building landmarks over a period of ten years. A case study approach was used within a qualitative research design. Data was collected through individual and group interviews, observations, story-telling and transect walks. The results were analysed through thematic, chronological, narrative and document analysis. Boseele’s successes with CIDA funding reflect positive foreign aid contributions towards the work of civil society organisations in Lesotho. However, setbacks and lack of continuity by a nursery project funded by MS-Lesotho show that the empowerment process is vulnerable where social and economic problems of individual members and communities are not fully addressed.

Este trabalho apresenta o processo de ampliação da infraestrutura laboratorial de minirredes e sistemas híbridos do Laboratório de Sistemas Fotovoltaicos do Instituto de Energia e Ambiente da Universidade de São Paulo, (LSF-IEE/USP). O trabalho também contempla uma revisão do estado da arte de sistemas híbridos e minirredes, apresentando principalmente os aspectos técnicos, como formas de acoplamento, e interações com a rede elétrica de distribuição. Descrevem-se os sistemas híbridos presentes no LSF e a infraestrutura para sua interconexão. Posteriormente são realizados os processos de comissionamento e testes operacionais da interconexão dos sistemas híbridos entre si e com a rede elétrica. Ao final é proposto um curso de aperfeiçoamento em minirredes e sistemas híbridos utilizando a infraestrutura presente no LSF. / This work presents the expansion of the micro-grid and hybrid systems infrastructure at the Laboratory of Photovoltaic Systems of the Institute of Energy and Environment at the University of São Paulo (LSF-IEE / USP). The work also presents a review of the state of the art of hybrid systems and micro-grid, presenting mainly the technical aspects, such as types of system interconnections and interactions with the main grid. The hybrid systems existent in the LSF, as well as the infrastructure for their interconnection are described. Subsequently, the commissioning process and the operational tests with the interconnection of the hybrid systems with each other and with the main grid are performed. At the end, a capacity building course on micro-grids and hybrid systems using the existent infrastructure in the LSF is proposed.