Arkansas Group of Evaluators (AGES)

The Arkansas Group of Evaluators has been meeting and providing training since 2005. The group consists of professional evaluators and individuals interested in learning more about evaluation. The purpose of AGES is to build evaluation capacity throughout the State, by sharing evaluation information and tools. AGES has provided evaluation training workshops in the following areas: empowerment evaluation, experimental design, quantitative methods, qualitative methods, focus groups, and interviews. In addition, educational technology workshops have been provided including topics such as: online surveys, blogs, web pages, videoconferencing on the net, and telephony.

AGES is a vital lifeline for many evaluators in the State. It helps to maintain an evaluation network, providing support and evaluation opportunities to members.

AGES emerged from the tobacco prevention work sponsored by the Minority Initiative Sub-Recipient Grant at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. In the process of collecting tobacco prevention data it became apparent that there was a need to build evaluation capacity throughout the State in many areas. For more information about that project see: http://tobaccoprevention.blogspot.com/
AGES is formally linked to the new Arkansas Evaluation Center and the evaluation certificate program at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. AGES provides an educational complement to these programs, providing specific training opportunities and a vehicle to help socialization of new evaluators to the field. For more information about the Center, see: http://arkansasevaluationcenter.blogspot.com. Ms. Linda Delaney is the chair of AGES. She can be reached at: linda2inspire@earthlink.net. Dr. David Fetterman, past-president of the American Evaluation Assocation, serves on the board of the group.