"BBC Media Action has made strengthening the evidence base of reports, data sets, and analysis about the role of media and communication in democratic development a priority. Yet, the extent to which different donor organizations, foundations, think tanks, practitioners, and academics utilize resear
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ch in general and BBC Media Action research in particular, remains uncertain. To shed greater light on this question, in October 2012, the Center for Global Communication Studies at the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania, conducted a quantitative survey followed by in-depth, structured interviews with 57 development stakeholders from four areas of development: governance, humanitarian response, health, and resilience. These research methods were used to investigate: (1) prevailing perceptions about and uses of media among assorted development stakeholders, (2) the extent to which these stakeholders are familiar with and utilize existing research concerning media development and media for development, (3) if and how funders are using this research to decide funding and policy making priorities, and (4) the specific impact of research and evidence initiated by BBC Media Action." (Executive summary)
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"This case study of USAID media assistance program reporting documents (n=68) looks at specific monitoring and evaluation characteristics as reported over a 20-year period and how reporting documents make the link to democratization. The analysis found that although M&E activity has improved as repo
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rted over the 20-year period of the study, 75 percent of the documents ranked in the lower half of cumulative M&E characteristics scoring. It also found that the relationship between democratization characteristics and media assistance are not clarified by the monitoring and evaluation data as reported. The study does show the USAID database to be a rich source of data about how media assistance programs have been implemented in different cultures, countries and political environments." (Abstract)
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"This article presents an overview of the emergence of sustainability themes in communication for development and argues that there is an urgent need for a framework of sustainability indicators for communication for development and social change projects around the world. It fills a crucial gap in
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the growing body of literature by first synthesizing the most relevant data currently produced by global and local institutions, NGOs, UN-based organizations, academics, and professionals regarding assessment indicators for development projects, and second, produces a framework of sustainability indicators that can be used by a wide variety of people in the field to assess the sustainability of existing projects and the sustainable potential of planned ones. It then tests the framework in two representative cases." (Abstract)
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"Behavior Change Communication (BCC) interventions have become an integral part of many HIV prevention programs. Monitoring and evaluation is expected to be included in the design of any BCC interventions from the beginning on. However, the know-how on how to demonstrate results and impacts of such
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interventions in a methodologically sound way often lags behind. This document aims at enhancing program officials' understanding of the importance of evaluations as well as the most important steps to take and decisions to make in the course of an evaluation, and at enabling them to oversee the work done by the evaluators.
It is divided into three parts. The first part presents the main general aspects that need to be taken into consideration when monitoring and evaluating BCC interventions with a focus on HIV-related BCC approaches. More specifically, a general framework for monitoring and evaluation is presented, including among others information on the use of appropriate indicators, the development of an evaluation plan, different types of evaluation, study designs of summative evaluations, statistical analysis and dissemination of the evaluation results. Based on this theoretical background presented in part one, the second part draws conclusions, presents recommendations and gives practical advice on monitoring and evaluating HIV BCC programs. Three types of HIV BCC interventions, relevant to the work of German Development Cooperation (GDC), are also here discussed; these are the tool Join-in-Circuit, peer education programs and mass media campaigns. The third part presents four country examples of M&E of HIV BCC interventions implemented by GDC programs. These were discussed during a short-course on evaluation of BBC interventions offered by GIZ from 9]10 March, 2012 in Johannesburg, South Africa." (Executive summary)
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"The gender-sensitive indicators for media (GSIM) is a non-prescriptive set of indicators, designed particularly for media of all forms. However it bears much relevance and usefulness to citizens' media groups advocating for gender equality, other non-governmental organizations, media associations,
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journalists' unions and clubs, media self-regulatory bodies, civil society organizations, especially those concerned with gender and media, government ministries or entities, academic institutions and research centres such as journalism, communication, technology schools and universities and other training institutes. The purpose is to encourage media organizations to make gender equality issues transparent and comprehensible to the public, as well as to analyze their own internal policies and practices with a view to take necessary actions for change. The hope is that media organizations will, through their own mechanisms, decide to adapt and apply these indicators to enhance media development and quality journalism." (Page 16)
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"Press freedom indices such as those administered by Freedom House, IREX, and Reporters Without Borders have emerged as crucial tools, not only for the general public, but also for donors, implementers, and academics in their attempts to understand the relationships among media assistance, democrati
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zation, and other forms of development. Bringing together a variety of viewpoints and perspectives on evaluating media assistance, Measures of Press Freedom and Media Contributions to Development offers a critical reflection on the theories and tools of measurements that are used by the academic, donor, and civil society communities. A variety of theoretical and geographic perspectives are drawn upon, offering a timely debate from both academics and practitioners." (Publisher description)
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"Elaborated on the basis of a literature review and consultations with 11 C4D focal points or monitoring and evaluation (M&E) specialists from 7 UN agencies and a 15-member expert panel. Based on this research, the report details a number of principles for effective, appropriate, and sustainable res
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earching, M&E of C4D." (commbox)
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"This report maps the evolution of evaluation and donor decision making in media development over the last two decades. Through interviews with media development donors, implementers and academics, we examine major donor perspectives on monitoring and evaluation (M&E), the main challenges within med
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ia development M&E, how donors define its goals and methods, and how they incorporate M&E into their funding decisions, if at all. The goal of this report is to aggregate the expertise of those experts with practical experience in all aspects of media development M&E. We find a vast majority of those interviewed believe there has been an increased emphasis on M&E, many report challenges when designing and implementing M&E, and donors do not always tie their funding decisions to M&E." (Executive summary)
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"A wide array of media development practitioners, donors, international broadcasters, and methodologists, all with extensive experience working in media initiatives in conflict environments met in Caux, Switzerland, in December 2010, to establish the Caux Guiding Principles, whose full text is in th
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is report. Based on a careful appraisal of the current status of monitoring and evaluating media interventions in conflict countries, the Caux Principles outline measures that stakeholders can take to improve evaluation. The Caux Principles urge those working in media and conflict initiatives to take several concrete steps to improve evaluation. These include enabling better collaboration between donors and implementers, expanding financial support for evaluation, encouraging realistic and honest assessments of project successes and failures, designing flexible evaluation plans that are sensitive to changing conditions on the ground, and engaging with local researchers." (Abstract)
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"This guide will take you through the essential steps for designing an evaluation of your community information project. These steps explain what to do and consider at different stages of the evaluation process: 1. Describe your project and identify your target audience. 2. Identify the evaluation
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s purpose and key questions. 3. Design the evaluation using effective methods. 4. Communicate and report the evaluation findings to make decisions and take action. We have included tips, tools and examples from community information projects that are currently being implemented by several grantees of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation’s Community Information Challenge (KCIC)." (Introduction, page 4)
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"This working paper aims to synthesize current efforts to develop comparable evaluation methods for social issue documentary films. Authored by two researchers who have been jointly documenting the field’s transformation over the past five years, this paper offers a framework for planning and eval
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uating the impact of these films in a networked media environment [...] Drawing insights from the design thinking field—a user-focused creation process that has emerged from the commercial design field and is now being applied to create and improve social sector projects—this working paper examines state-of-the art methodologies for strategic design and evaluation of documentaries. The report’s recommendations are informed by lessons from six case studies of representative films: A Lion in the House; The Line; Lioness; Not in Our Town; Out in the Silence; and State of Fear. These are all award-winning projects featuring compelling documentary films at the center of multiplatform strategic outreach campaigns. All have been screened in traditional broadcast and/or film festival settings, as well as venues designed to engage publics and mobilize advocates relevant to the issue being addressed. These producers utilize a variety of technologies and both online and offline organizing tactics. At their most powerful, they catalyze and support issue-based networks that connect individuals with relevant organizations and empower participants not only to learn about and discuss shared problems, but to organize for action and respond to breaking developments. In this way, documentaries feed both social movements and the broader public sphere." (Introduction)
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"The organizations that conduct country rankings should continue to increase technical sophistication, cultural neutrality, and transparency. In particular, continued attention must be paid to digital media, notably the Internet and mobile phones, which now number approximately 4.6 billion worldwide
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. Donors and implementers of media assistance, meanwhile, should keep up efforts to find better ways to monitor and evaluate specific programs and to share the resulting information with other aid organizations. At a time of financial shortfalls, foundations and other funding bodies should assure that assessment of media quality at both the national and the program level receives the attention (and the money) that it deserves." (Executive summary, page 5)
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"United Nations agencies currently do not have commonly agreed tools for assessing the impact of Communication for Development (C4D) programmes. This paper is designed to help them explore the key issues surrounding C4D, consider case studies and best practice methodology and propose a set of draft
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indicators for monitoring and evaluation (M&E). Nevertheless, this publication is also of value for anybody interested in M&E. It presents in a clear and succinct way the principal tools and approaches, from conventional, quantitative research techniques to more intricate, participatory processes, and it summarises the challenges to communication for development M&E. Case studies are used to illustrate how initiatives have used a variety of approaches to gather informative results and feed these back into programme design. The authors emphasise that a tailored toolkit approach is necessary in order to deal with the many complexities of C4D evaluation. They highlight the need for flexibility within any evaluation and discuss the strengths of Most Significant Change, Outcome Mapping and the Logframe as state of the art evaluation techniques. Qualitative and quantitative tools should be used as complementary strategies for providing the most comprehensive, clear and pragmatic assessment and reporting of C4D." (CAMECO Update 4-2009)
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