Open research questions in Evaluation and Performance Assessment
73 unresolved questions extracted from the limitations and future-work sections of 4,381 Evaluation and Performance Assessment papers in our library. Each links back to the study that raised it.
What the literature leaves open
This article is dedicated to creating awareness of the current situation by highlighting how more intensive engagement with the unique aspects and underexplored opportunities of SSC might help shift paradigms and practices in evaluation, especially but not only in the Global South.
Abstract: In order for the evaluation field to ensure its salience over the next decade, high-profile areas of work have to be sought where evaluative practices are underexplored or undervalued yet can help inspire and accelerate urgently needed transformations while also advancing evaluation theory and practice.
My conclusion is that the department has overestimated both the validity and the reliability of the check: partly because important sources of measurement error have not been explored, and partly because the available evidence has not been analysed in sufficient depth — or perhaps simply been ignored by the department.
Policy and evidence: a critical analysis of the Year 1 Phonics Screening Check in England · 2017 · DOIAdditionally, it is argued that scholars and researchers are rarely explicit about their orientations, and there is insufficient consideration of the political implications of different value positions for prescriptions for future TJ programmes.
The analysis finds that evaluations of Sierra Leonean TJ can be found displaying each of the six value orientations, with no agreement about the success of the TJ programme from within orientations, let alone across them.
Background: Although pediatric healthcare organizations have widely implemented the philosophy of family-centered care (FCC), evaluators and health professionals have not explored how to preserve the philosophy of FCC in evaluation processes.
Thinking Beyond Measurement, Description and Judgement: Fourth Generation Evaluation in Family-Centered Pediatric Healthcare Organizations · 2012 · DOIEven so, Hansen and Foss Hansen (2000) argue that not much is known about the actual evaluation praxis, the institutionalization of evaluation, and its impact in politics and administration.
Given such features as time limits and benefits caps that vary widely across states and communities, it is necessary not only to attend to urgent issues of immediate relevance for individuals on public assistance but also to focus on important long-term analyses of this complex intergovernmental set of policies.
Studies of evaluation processes are found to be limited by a lack of descriptive information on actual evaluation practices in schools and classrooms, a concentration on one or two aspects of a multifaceted evaluation process, and the failure to consider the multiple purposes that evaluation systems must serve in schools and classrooms.
The analytical framework is comprised of 10 dimensions referring to: (1) the definition of evaluation, (2) its functions, (3) the objects of evaluation, (4) the variables that should be investigated, (5) criteria that should be used, (6) the audiences that should be served, (7) the process of doing an evaluation, (8) its methods of inquiry, (9) the characteristics of the evaluator, and (10) the standards that should be used to judge the worth and merit of an evaluation.
The Conceptualization of Educational Evaluation: An Analytical Review of the Literature · 1983 · DOIMethodolo- gies employing tricks such as those suggested in the previous section should produce somewhat better esti- mates, but in the absence of any validation research it is an open question whether even these methods are good enough to be of practical use. (It frequently proves convenient to use the expected utility in purely theoretical con- siderations also, though there is insufficient space here to discuss the theoretical uses of expectation in retrieval theory.
On selecting a measure of retrieval effectiveness part II. Implementation of the philosophy · 1973 · DOIEnke (1967: 4-5) has argued that, in the case of the RAND Corporation and the United States Air Force, extended interaction and independence have been blended so as to produce a high level of useful policy work, but that a number of unusual features were required: Project RAND’s contract includes several little known peculiari- ties that together go far to explain the extraordinary success of RAND.
The Capacity of Social Science Organizations To Per Form Large-Scale Evaluative Research · 1972 · DOITotals 18 14 25 57 4 1 3 8' 30 24 37 91 52 39 65 156 Responses of project directors and university consultants in a cross-community analysis correspond closely with the responses given by citizen advisory committee members in a comparison of percentages in response categories, as follows: directors and con sultants show 32 percent response in the "strengths" category, com pared to 33 percent for the citizen advisory committee members. Downloaded by [University of California, San Diego] at 13:02 29 June 2016 Thomas 81 response, compared to 26 percent In the "weaknesses" category, directors and consultants show 24 for citizen advisory percent committee members. And in the "recommendations" category, di rectors and consultants have a 44 percent response and the citizen advisory committee members, 41 percent. The weak response from trainees reveals a major weakness in the evaluation of this program. Only nine trainees were interviewed, two in community A, six in B, and one in C. The fact that the largest percentage of trainee responses (50 percent) was in the "strengths" category might be interpreted to mean that trainees may have been more prone to speak of "strengths" than "weaknesses" because to them project involvement was a wel comed break from the routine of university graduate study. The small sample of trainees interviewed, however, invalidates any at tempt at analysis of this part of the population. B.
This information would then be organized at Block 11, so that major program thrusts could be examined and analyzed on a nationwide basis at Block 12 and so that reports could be prepared for the Associate Com- missioner for Elementary and Secondary Education, the Commissioner of Education, the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, the President, and the Congress.
Evaluation problems in education—many faceted and most difficult—require collaboration and large investments of resources to be solved. The following recommendations, focused within the context of the Title I program, are suggested for improving educational evaluation both now and in the future. 1. The U.S. Office of Education, state education departments, universities, and local school districts should collaborate to provide effective evaluation. Such collaboration is required if data collected at the local level are to provide the information necessary Downloaded by [University of North Carolina] at 09:53 12 November 2014 132 THEORY INTO PRACTICE for local, state, and Federal evaluation. The Federal agency must provide the overall framework, including definitions of the Federal programs, fundamental objectives, and future decisions about the evolution of the program which must be based on evaluative data collected at the local level. State education departments should provide specific structure, direction, and control for statewide evaluations. The states' plans should be consistent with Federal evaluation requirements, but should specify unique statewide goals and special decisions to be made at the state level. Universities should contribute by conducting research, developing needed instruments and methods, suggesting appropriate data analysis designs, and conducting computer data analysis. Local schools should help by planning and implementing basic data collection and analysis. All of these functions can be accomplished much more effectively and economically through cooperative rather than unilateral effort. 2. Specific state plans for evaluation should be developed immediately. State evaluation plans should be specific enough that comparable data can be collected for similar projects. Projects should be classified according to clearly explicated statewide objectives. Instruments for measuring them should be selected and/or developed and administered on a statewide, pretest and posttest basis. By such an approach, how well a state's Title I program meets state and Federal goals could be assessed. Without a specific plan, little sense can be made of the statewide or Federal picture. Unfortunately, my recent survey of the fifty state education departments revealed that only a few states have prepared specific plans for evaluating their Title I programs. One major objection to statewide evaluation is that it would be too time consuming. Another is that statewide tests often influence schools to compete for high scores and consequently to adopt as their major teaching objectives those covered by the tests.
While this information has been supplemented to some degree by the observations of the training staff and committees related to the National Council or the Center for the Behavioral Sciences, other avenues of approach are being planned to include the gaining of additional data from the Institutes, analysis of a follow-up study, and additional studies of participants in the “on-the-job” setting.
General effectiveness, it should be par- ticularly noted, is what college speech teachers think makes a good speech, and how well such an opinion correlates with a practical criterion, such as the amount of information retained or the extent of attitude change, is beyond the scope of this study.
Nevertheless, perspective-oriented analyses may still contribute value by identifying underexplored tensions, structural conditions, and conceptual challenges relevant to research funding systems, particularly in areas where systematic comparative research remains limited.
Trust, transparency, and disciplinary alignment in research funding evaluations: an illustrative case from the Norwegian AI Center call (2024–2025) · 2026 · DOITransferability is a process of abstraction used to apply information drawn from specific persons, settings, and eras to others that have not been directly studied.
One question that has not yet been fully explored is whether program evaluations carried out or commissioned by developers produce larger effect sizes than evaluations conducted by independent third parties.
In this perspective, curriculum and evaluation are not limited to the prescription of content or skills, nor to exams or tests at specific moments, as they go through an emancipatory education and unrelated to management aspects.
Abstract: Despite a great deal of discussion about the notion of professionalizing evaluation practice around the world, many associated concepts are not clearly defined.
Abstract Despite a growing literature on the politics of evaluation in international organizations (IOs) and beyond, little is known about whether political or administrative stakeholders indeed realize ex-ante political interests through evaluations.
Background: Little is known about the status of program evaluation culture and practice in the English Speaking Commonwealth Caribbean (ESCC).
An Exploratory Study on Public Sector Program Evaluation Practices and Culture in Barbados, Belize, Guyana and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines: Where Are We? Where Do We Need To Go? · 2019 · DOIWhile evidence-based policy-making is increasingly in demand, as new policies are required to bring effective results to targeted groups in South Korea and China, few studies have investigated the progress of quantitative impact evaluation that focuses on causality.
Most-cited papers in Evaluation and Performance Assessment
- Why Triangulate? · Educational Researcher · 1988 · 731 citations
- The Invisible Cage: Workers’ Reactivity to Opaque Algorithmic Evaluations · Administrative Science Quarterly · 2021 · 266 citations
- Model Evaluation: An Adequacy-for-Purpose View · Philosophy of Science · 2020 · 197 citations
- Evaluating Student Evaluations of Teaching: a Review of Measurement and Equity Bias in SETs and Recommendations for Ethical Reform · Journal of Academic Ethics · 2021 · 178 citations
- Transferability and Generalization in Qualitative Research · Research on Social Work Practice · 2024 · 153 citations
- Can Principals Promote Teacher Development as Evaluators? A Case Study of Principals’ Views and Experiences · Educational Administration Quarterly · 2016 · 138 citations
- The Impact of Evaluation Processes on Students · Educational Psychologist · 1987 · 129 citations
- Evaluation in health professions education—Is measuring outcomes enough? · Medical Education · 2021 · 99 citations
- Are We Making the Grade? A National Overview of Financial Education and Program Evaluation · Journal of Consumer Affairs · 2006 · 85 citations
- The Conceptualization of Educational Evaluation: An Analytical Review of the Literature · Review of Educational Research · 1983 · 71 citations
Most recent work
- Governing Science through Evaluation: A Global Heuristic of Research Evaluation Regimes · Minerva · 2026
- A prospective and deductive analysis tool for qualitative inquiry into social capital · 2026
- A critical discourse analysis of a rural health promotion project: Exploring insights for evaluation · Journal of Rural Studies · 2026
- Ungrading for freedom: Reforming assessment · Journal of Moral Education · 2026
- Analysis of the Evaluation Framework of European Union-Funded Tourism Projects · Tourism · 2026
- Youth Reflections on Learning Program Evaluation Through Empowerment Evaluation · American Journal of Evaluation · 2026
- Innovation and breakthroughs in basic education evaluation in the context of artificial intelligence · Journal of Education and Educational Policy Studies · 2026
- A cross-sectional assessment of extension specialists’ evaluation training needs · Advancements in Agricultural Development · 2026
- Programme Evaluation and Performance Management in East African Development Programmes: Evidence from South Sudan · Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) · 2026
- Outcome-based measurement for developmental services: A human capabilities-oriented framework · Evaluation · 2026
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