A few weeks ago, Martin Ravallion wrote a great blog on “shoe-string” evaluations, in which he suggested that there are ways of bypassing two of the most costly items in rigorous Impact Evaluations: contemporaneous credible baseline data; and second, “objectively assessed outcome indicators”, which are based on surveys. Ravallion then proposed a “shoestring” solution that … [Read more...] about Randomized Control Trials on a Budget
Beyond development effectiveness
What Works in Development?
Given the importance that institutionalization of monitoring and evaluation (M&E) capacities is assuming in the Region, on Thursday March 15 at the IDB Annual Meeting we organized jointly with IDRC the seminar “What works in development? Impact evaluation for the design and implementation of public policies.” The seminar was a very stimulating opportunity to generate a high … [Read more...] about What Works in Development?
Spreading the news: Impact evaluation on video
Most of the material available on impact evaluation resides in technical papers with very limited readership. Some “interesting” results get exposure in widely read sites such as Freakonomics and then are amplified by public radio stations across the US. In the past year some great books have come out that aim to provide more accessible accounts of impact evaluation such as … [Read more...] about Spreading the news: Impact evaluation on video
On theories of change and missing data: why I want a cat
I haven’t had much time to write a blog entry this week and the one I was writing became too complicated (on cognitive bias and discrimination - started very intuitively but I became mired in very slow thinking). … [Read more...] about On theories of change and missing data: why I want a cat
Notes from the field: help me improve
In my previous blog, I shared some thoughts on the challenges of evaluating and measuring teaching methods innovations. More specifically, on the challenges of measuring the impact of an intensive instruction program using the Rassias teaching method on English as a second language teaching. The program is targeted at teachers with an intermediate to low level of English. In … [Read more...] about Notes from the field: help me improve