Call for Abstracts – Evaluation Standards Scholarship
2021-07-27
Scholars and practitioners in the field of evaluation are invited to submit brief abstracts proposing papers focused on the Program Evaluation Standards (PES) issued by the Joint Committee for Standards on Educational Evaluation (JCSEE) or by other officially adapted versions (e.g., the CDC Evaluation Standards). Selected abstracts will be invited to publish complete papers in for a special issue of the Journal of MultiDisciplinary Evaluation (JMDE).
The special issue of the JMDE will provide a broad spectrum of scholarship related to the application of JCSEE PES. The intent is to promote knowledge and use of the PES among practicing evaluators and applied evaluation scholars. It is hoped that this issue will entice practitioners who may not be aware of the JCSEE PES to learn more about them and encourage those who are already familiar with the standards to consider applying them in their own work.
Abstracts should reflect a strong and direct focus on the JCSEE Program Evaluation Standards. The editors expect that the scholarship will fall into one of the following categories listed below.
- Case studies of the Application of Standards. These papers will use a case study format to provide a detailed example and/or analysis of the application of standards in the planning, execution, or quality assessment of an actual evaluation project. Accepted case studies must have a clear focus on the use or application of standards and, if necessary, relate those used to the PES rather than merely report methods or findings. Case study papers may be based on prior publications or evaluations previously conducted by the author (necessary and appropriate release of copyright documented by the author as a condition of submission).
- Standards scholarship. Papers reporting scholarship including, but not limited to, reviews of the literature, reports of practice, scholarly inquiry, comparisons of standards statements, and conceptual and theoretical considerations expressly related to the JCSEE PES are expected to be a major component of the special issue. Examples of this type of scholarship may include activity examining how the PES are used by a specific organization or within a particular discipline; systematic reviews of standards usage; reports of interviews with evaluators on the topic of standards development or use; rigorous comparisons between the PES and other practice standards; standards dissemination; or qualitative feedback from evaluation clients on the usefulness of the standards.
- Standards education or guidance. Papers submitted in this category will present scholarship and reports of practice focused on the application of the PES in the context of education, training, or the development of tools or guidance related to the standards. Examples include, but are not limited to, reports of how standards are presented in evaluation training courses or papers discussing the development of tools or resources for learning the standards. The papers submitted in this category should discuss work or findings where the education resource, training session, tool, or resource is either predominately or entirely focused on the PES.
The editors also welcome abstracts proposing other, novel forms of scholarship not listed above, as long as the material has a strong connection to the PES.
Submission Guidelines
Format & Length: Abstracts submitted for consideration must be no longer than 500 words, not including references or figures. The content may be pasted into the submission email as text or attached as a Microsoft Word or Adobe PDF file; no other formats will be opened by the reviewers. All abstracts should be in English and follow APA guidelines.
Inclusion Criteria
The editors will select abstracts based on relevance to the JCSEE PES, significance to the evaluation field, clarity of writing, and overall quality.
Instructions, Deadline, and Expected Publication Schedule
Abstracts should be emailed to brad.r.watts@wmich.edu no later than Monday, September 13, 2021.
After the panel of editors reviews the abstracts, authors will be notified by October 15 if they are invited to submit full papers for publication.
Authors can expect at least three months to complete and submit their full papers.
The anticipated publication date for the special issue of JMDE is summer 2022.