Making informed decisions is the essential beginning to any successful development project. Before the project even begins, you can use needs assessment approaches to guide your decisions. This book is filled with practical strategies that can help you define the desired results and select the most appropriate activities for achieving them.

In 1995, Witkin and Altschuld proposed a three phase process model of needs assessment: - Preassessment (learning as much as possible from existing, inexpensive sources) - Assessment (collecting new information about the needs in consideration) - Postassessment (prioritizing needs, understanding their causes, and translating priorities into action plans for organizations). The model has been extensively re-conceptualized and forms the basis for this book. The content includes a user-oriented approach to a comprehensive overview of the three phases and the 14 key steps necessary to implement them. Numerous examples and practical illustrations are given throughout the text as guidance for needs assessors and those who do research on the topic. An extensive glossary of needs-related terms and an outline of a final report are also provided. The book is the first one in the Needs Assessment KIT with connections to the other four.

"This encyclopedia provides a thorough examination of concepts, technologies, policies, training, and applications of ICT in support of economic and regional developments around the globe"--Provided by publisher.

Social workers are increasingly met with the demands of evaluating their own programs and practice to maintain accountability with stakeholders, secure funding, and to remedy a number of large-scale problems facing our society. One of the four basic areas of the Educational Policy and Accreditation Standards (EPAS), evaluation, is a critical process for demonstrating social work programs' ability to help the clients and communities they serve. Social Work Evaluation, Third Edition, offers a straightforward guide in a broad range of social work evaluations at both the program and practice levels. Author James R. Dudley's seven-step approach to evaluation makes use of qualitative, quantitative, and mixed research methods to identify oversight and issues at the planning, implementation, and final outcome stages of intervention development. His unique focus on involving clients in the evaluation process ensures social workers consistently improve their capacity to impact clients' well-being and remain accountable to the communities they serve. Case examples from the author's extensive experience in evaluation illustrate a number of logic-based methods discussed throughout the text for real-world application. This comprehensive text aims to enhance student and practitioner skill sets to meet the demands of a changing field.

Archival snapshot of entire looseleaf Code of Massachusetts Regulations held by the Social Law Library of Massachusetts as of January 2020.

Accountability to stakeholders is essential for program funding and policy development. It is increasingly the responsibility of all professionals to provide evidence supporting the relevance and effectiveness of their programs and individual practices. Social Work Evaluation is a straightforward guide to conducting evaluations during the planning, implementation, and outcome stages of programs and practices. Dudley has developed a seven step process for evaluations using qualitative, quantitative, and mixed research methods. This comprehensive book offers students the knowledge and skills to play a more accountable role in the future of their profession.

This Handbook provides a comprehensive, authoritative and up-to-date source of information and analysis about all aspects of the work of the Probation Service. It takes full account of the many changes that the Probation Service has undergone over the last few years, and is currently undergoing as probation becomes part of the broader National Offender Management Service. Contributors to the book are drawn from leading academics and practitioners in the field, drawing upon the best expertise available. Running through the book is a concern with a range of key current issues such as addressing the diversity of offenders and creating effective links with other criminal justice agencies, and it includes perspectives from both probation service staff and from offenders and victims. This book is an essential text for practitioners, trainees and students of probation and those studying it as part of a wider criminology or criminal justice course.