Introduction: Administrators of Child Advocacy Centers (CACs) must possess a number of skills, including knowing how to conduct an evaluation. This resource book, written expressly for CAC administrators, is designed to give administrators who have varying amounts of evaluation experience the knowledge they will need to conduct either one-time or ongoing evaluations.

This manual can also be used by those who contract with an external evaluator; it will be helpful in educating external evaluators about the issues surrounding a CAC evaluation.

Evaluation is essential. It is the only way to ensure that a program is benefiting, not harming, the people it is designed to help (Thompson and McClintock 1998). There was a time when reducing the number of interviews to one was the ultimate goal of a CAC. Research has shown, however, that it is sometimes beneficial and necessary to interview children more than once (for example, by using the extended forensic assessment) (Carnes 2001; Carnes, Wilson, and Nelson-Gardell 1999; Myers, Saywitz, and Goodman 1996).

Some directors have said that creating an evaluation resource applicable to all CAC administrators would be unlikely because each center is unique. Indeed, some researchers have argued that when programs such as CACs are widely diverse, it is impossible to conclude from an evaluation of a sample of projects whether the program’s concept is effective (Rossi, Freeman, and Lipsey 1999)

CACs conduct their operations differently, but that does not preclude the development of a general evaluation manual. Indeed, results of a telephone interview with program directors revealed vast similarities among their centers’ core components (Jackson 2004)...

Download A Resource for Evaluating Child Advocacy Centers

PDF format, 1.99MB, 426Pages.

Visit A Resource for Evaluating Child Advocacy Centers Official Website

About the Author

Shelly L. Jackson, Ph.D., is Director of Grants Program and Development at the Institute of Law, Psychiatry and Public Policy at the University of Virginia. She was a Visiting Fellow at the National Institute of Justice at the time she developed this book

Comments (0)

Name

Email

Comment

smaller | bigger

Add Comment