Coalition for Evidence-Based Policy
Social Programs That Work, a site developed by the Coalition for Evidence-Based Policy, provides policymakers and practitioners with clear, actionable information on 'what works' in social policy, as demonstrated in scientifically-valid studies. Specifically, the site summarizes the findings from a select group of well-designed randomized controlled trials ("gold standard" studies) that have particularly important policy implications -- because they show, for example, that a social program has a major effect on life outcomes of participants, or because they show that a widely-implemented social program has little or no effect.
The International Organization for Cooperation in Evaluation (IOCE)
The IOCE is a loose alliance of regional and national evaluation organizations from around the world that collaborate to: build evaluation leadership and capacity in developing countries, foster the cross-fertilization of evaluation theory and practice around the world, address international challenges in evaluation, and assist the evaluation profession to take a more global approach to contributing to the identification and solution of world problems. It offers linkages to other evaluation organizations, forums that network evaluators internationally, news of events and important initiatives, and opportunities to exchange ideas, practices, and insights with evaluation associations, societies and networks throughout the world.
The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL)
The MIT initiative J-PAL is dedicated to fighting poverty by ensuring that policy decisions are based on scientific evidence. Located in the Economics Department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, J-PAL brings together a network of researchers at several universities who work on randomized evaluations. J-PAL works with governments, aid agencies, bi-lateral donors, and NGOs to (1) evaluate the effectiveness of anti-poverty programs using randomized evaluations, (2) disseminate the findings and their policy implications, and (3) promote the use of randomized evaluations, including by training practitioners in how to carry them out.
The Campbell Collaboration
The international Campbell Collaboration (C2) is a non-profit organization that aims to help people make well-informed decisions about the effects of interventions in the social, behavioral and educational arenas. C2's objectives are to prepare, maintain and disseminate systematic reviews of studies of interventions. It acquires and promote access to information about trials of interventions. C2 builds summaries and electronic brochures of reviews and reports of trials for policy makers, practitioners, researchers and the public.
The DAC Network on Development Evaluation
The DAC Network on Development Evaluation brings together representatives from thirty bilateral and multilateral development agencies. They work together on improving evaluation for more effective development assistance.
Inter-American Development Bank. EvalNet.
The Office of Evaluation and Oversight (OVE) of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is creating a network of evaluation professionals, to be dubbed the Latin American Evaluation Network, or EvalNet. EvalNet will serve as a forum for practitioners and academics interested in evaluation of development projects in Latin America and the Caribbean.
International Program for Development Evaluation Training (IPDET): Online Course Modules
IPDET 2005 is an initiative aimed at increasing the capacity for evaluation among senior and mid-level evaluation and audit professionals working in developed and developing country governments, bilateral and multilateral development agencies, or non-governmental organizations. It offers a two-week core course designed to cover development evaluation basics, followed by two weeks of 26 free-standing workshops on specific development evaluation topics.
OECD-DAC Evaluation Abstracts Inventory
This web site provides a summary of evaluations that are available throughout the international development donor community. Abstracts of each report are provided along with the full text of the report if it is available. Evaluations can be retrieved by donor, country/region, sector, evaluation type, date or keyword. The site supported by the DAC Working Party on AID Evaluation of the OECD and managed by the Canadian International Development Agency.
World Bank: The Development IMpact Evaluation (DIME) Initiative
The World Bank identified several bottlenecks that limit its ability to conduct impact evaluations at the necessary scale and with the needed continuity: insufficient resources, inadequate incentives, and, in some cases, lack of knowledge and understanding. To address these bottlenecks, the Development IMpact Evaluation (DIME) Initiative is a Bank-wide collaborative effort under the leadership of the Bank’s Chief Economist that is oriented at: (1) increasing the number of Bank projects with impact evaluation components, particularly in strategic areas and themes; (2) increasing the ability of staff to design and carry out such evaluations, and (3) building a process of systematic learning on effective development interventions based on lessons learned from completed evaluations.