High Impact Anti-crime Program - A Framework for Assessing Project-level Evaluation Plans

• NCJ Number: 80269
• Author(s): G Kupersmith
• Date Published: 1975
• Length: 17 pages
• Contract Number(s): F 19628-73-C-001
• Sponsoring Agency: US Dept of Justice; US Dept of Justice NIJ Pub
• Corporate Author: Mitre Corporation
• Sale Source: Superintendent of Documents, GPO; National Institute of Justice/
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This paper outlines a model and set of criteria for reviewing project-level evaluation plans which were developed within the context of the LEAA's High Impact Anti-Crime Program designed to address the problem of street crime and burglary in eight major U.S. cities.

Abstract

Following a brief discussion of current demands on social program evaluations, the role of evaluations in the Impact Program is described. City evaluators were responsible for determining the extent to which crime problems targeted by a specific project improved in the manner originally anticipated, and these evaluations provided vital information to decisionmakers and planners. The project-level evaluation planning model which evolved from the Impact Program experience states that identification of a specific crime problem is the real starting point of the process, followed by a determination of what the project expects to accomplish in terms of its effectiveness and specific activities. Measures must then be developed which are not only valid indicators of the concepts and aims they are designed to reflect, but also are sensitive to changes that the project is trying to implement. The next step, creating an evaluation design, emphasizes locating a basis for comparison which allows the evaluator to assess whether changes in outcome measures can reasonably be attributed to the project's activities. Methods examined include randomly selected control groups and matched samples. A data collection plan must consider information relating to project activity and outcomes and data on the research design's control feature. Major components of the data collection plan are identification of potential data sources and construction of the collection instruments. Responsibilities for collection and validation should be specified. An evaluation plan must also detail a system for monitoring project activities and reporting project outcomes. A list of review questions provides a method for systematically assessing project-level evaluation plans. A diagram depicts key steps in the model evaluation planning process.