Dear Evaluation Colleagues,

 

The American Evaluation Association (AEA) Board has launched an "International Listening Project" to help us set strategic directions for our international collaborations with evaluators, evaluation associations, and evaluation clients around the globe. The Board sees this initiative as aligned with AEA's mission and values, specifically reflecting AEA's commitment to valuing a global and international evaluation community and understanding of evaluation practices.  AEA is now positioned to engage more actively in the international arena, but we want our activities to be guided by and forged in collaboration with our international partners. The Listening Project is intended to help us listen well to the ideas for international evaluation initiatives of our members as well as our colleagues around the globe.

 

Jim Rugh will be conducting this International Listening Project on behalf of AEA.  His proposal was the one selected in an open competition for this project.  

 

I strongly encourage you to participate in this important endeavor.

 

Jennifer Greene

 

Colleagues,

 

As Jennifer wrote in her introduction, the AEA Board of Directors has launched an "International Listening Project" to gather suggestions as it considers strategies that would guide AEA into enhanced engagement with the international communities of evaluators, evaluation organizations and clients of evaluation. 

 

I am writing to you now on behalf of AEA to invite you to participate in this process.

 

This International Listening Project offers several modalities for soliciting input. 

1.    The primary instrument for soliciting individual input is an online questionnaire accessible at http://www.surveygizmo.com/s3/574552/AEA-International-Listening-Survey. We invite you to go there now and submit your suggestions.  We estimate that it should not take more than 15 minutes of your time.

2.    Another modality for sharing is an interactive blog where multiple persons can offer their suggestions and comment on the suggestions of others.  After you respond to the SurveyGizmo questionnaire we invite you to go to http://aea-internationallistening.wikispaces.com/Invitation+to+participate where you can join the discussions on that blog.

3.    Another mode would be to send your personal comments directly to me via e-mail: JimRugh@mindspring.com. 

 

We solicit your contributions in whatever form.

 

Invitations to participate in this International Listening Project are being sent to AEA members, representatives of international institutions and partner associations, as well as individual professional colleagues in other countries. Though the Board and this project are focused on policy implications, we anticipate that many of the suggestions we will receive may point to specific activities. We will note those suggestions as illustrative of the kinds of potential activities AEA's policies should foster, and as a preliminary set of possible initiatives, consistent with those policies.

 

We hope to complete the first round of input by August 1.  A draft of the synthesis, including a preliminary list of policy recommendations, will be posted to the Wickispaces blog site shortly thereafter, where participants will have an opportunity to provide feedback.  A draft summary report will then be presented to the AEA Board by the end of August.  It is anticipated that a final Board-approved report of the International Listening Project will be completed and disseminated by mid-October.  There will then be opportunity for further direct involvement by members during a Think Tank discussion as part of the AEA conference in Anaheim the first week of November.

 

So please accept this invitation to share your ideas for how AEA should (or should not) be more engaged internationally.

 

Jim Rugh

Coordinator of the AEA International Listening Project

JimRugh@mindspring.com