Case study

The course aims to engage participants in thinking about design options and methodological opportunities for improving monitoring and evaluation (M&E) frameworks to move towards a participatory learning practice.

During the course we share a suite of innovative and cutting-edge participatory methods to help participants and the programmes they are involved in to learn about how the changes they desire to support (the impact sought) unfold through the experiences of those engaged directly in the change processes.

Increasingly, donors and NGOs are using complexity aware, learning-based approaches to design and drive their M&E systems. In spite of much conceptual movement towards more learning-based approaches to M&E and adaptive programming, much practice continues to be based on linear, indicator driven methods that fail to capture learning about how change is unfolding or offer insights into how development interventions are contributing or inhibiting it.

Participatory approaches are widely recognised for their ability to deeply engage stakeholders and build meaningful ownership, however, have been heavily critiqued for being too localized. This is true of the early participatory M&E approaches espoused in the 1990s in community development. Methods are now available for quality implementation of participatory processes at scale (with large numbers of people and across broader geographical space) as well as for understanding how use of learning focused M&E can catalyse change processes and scale their outcomes.

This short course builds on the deep historical experience with participatory approaches and methods that IDS has pioneered. It shares new frontier methods for quality implementation of participatory processes at scale together with reflexive practice to engage in a new and exciting area of research and practice – participatory evaluation research.

Both the online and in-person versions of the course combine lectures, plenary discussions, facilitated small group work, peer-learning and self-directed learning. These activities are supported by a reading list, and case study material. The online course includes 12 live facilitated sessions as well as pre-recorded lectures.

Since 2019, the course has been co-convened with Steff Deprez of Voices that Count. Steff brings in a wealth of practical experience in social impact measurement as well as cutting-edge thinking connected to the monitoring and evaluation spaces in Europe and beyond.

The course is delivered by:

• Marina Apgar, IDS Research Fellow
• Steff Deprez, Development practitioner and co-Founder of Voices that Count
• Mieke Snijder

Guest speakers and facilitators have included:

• Sophie Pinwell, Clear Horizon Consulting
• Dee Jupp, Associate Consultant, Empatika
• Tiffany Fairey, Research Fellow, King’s College London

Since we began running this course in 2018, we have helped to build the capacity of more than 77 individuals to more effectively design and improve monitoring and evaluation systems supporting participatory and adaptive practice.

Each course has enabled participants to develop their:

• Understanding of where participatory and learning based approaches to M&E fit within broader approaches to evaluation
• Knowledge of specific participatory methods and their application in M&E processes
• Ability to critically interrogate and analyse methods
• Ability to integrate methods in M&E design.

Each participant also developed a coherent plan to support personal or organisational goals relating to building a more participatory and complexity-aware processes.

A follow-up survey with participants in 2022, revealed wider impacts of the course. Respondents said the course had led to:

• An expansion of their professional career and attainment of their career goals;
• Organisational uptake of methods such as Outcome Mapping, Outcome Harvesting and Participatory Causal Mapping;
• Strengthened organisational policies and frameworks for M&E; and
• An opening-up of new markets for their organisations.

Ripple effects were achieved via one participant who shared their learnings from the course in a ‘training for trainers’ session aimed at strengthening knowledge on participatory evaluation methods with partner civil society organisations in Cambodia.

Find out more about the content and apply for the next course start date.