The UCI Interdisciplinary Center for the Scientific Study of Ethics and Morality presents

"Getting to Know You? Evaluating the Effects of Contract through Peace Dialogue Programs"
An Ethics Workshop with Johanna Solomon, Graduate Student, Political Science, UC Irvine

Friday, May 11, 2012
12:30-1:50 p.m.
Social Sciences Plaza B, Room 5250

Peace programs - from education initiatives to workshops - have grown to become a part of peace and reconciliation efforts worldwide. How can these programs be evaluated? Outcome focused evaluation may lend one answer to these questions. These programs of evaluation, created to address the usefulness of government programming, have produced a vast literature on how to evaluate programs including peace efforts. However, it remains largely divorced from academic inquiries. In her talk, Solomon will examine the intersection between use and academic focused peace program evaluations. She will review past evaluation of peace programs and the theories upon which they stand from both utilization focused and academically focused perspectives, using an example protocol from an ongoing research study involving a popular and growing peace dialogue program (the Olive Tree Initiative) to demonstrate challenges and opportunities related to program evaluation in the field. Last, she will note particular challenges to the data, including working with confidentiality, small numbers, moderation, and unique programs, as well as raise questions for further study.

For further information, please contact Sandy Cushman, scushman@uci.edu or 949-824-3344.