The Evaluation Helpdesk’s EvaluationWORKS! 2021 yearly capacity building events provided a forum for learning and exchange in each Member State focused on the following topics:
- Better data for evaluating the CAP.
- Evaluation plans: Experiences and outlook to the future.
- How to deal with contextual changes and new regulations for monitoring and evaluation?
The EvaluationWORKS! 2021 events aim to:
- Provide an annual forum for the exchange of information among stakeholders directly or indirectly involved in RDP evaluations.
- Discuss evaluation challenges and strengthen the capacity of all participants.
- Analyse the outcomes of the discussions and share the findings with relevant stakeholders at the Member State and EU-level.
Given that the needs and capacity building interests of Member States have become increasingly diverse as the end of the programming period approaches, Member States were able to pick and choose which topics they would like to cover in order to tailor their events to their specific needs.
Additionally, this year the Evaluation Helpdesk offered a new innovative option of peer-learning seminars which can be conducted between two or more Member States. These events included input presentations from participating Member States, as well as complementary presentations and guiding discussion questions provided by the Evaluation Helpdesk. In addition to this collective capacity building approach, some of these transnational workshops benefitted from the presence of a thematic expert, who guided Member States in developing applicable proposals for their specific concerns.
The trainings were attended by a total of 486 participants and included representatives from the following categories of evaluation stakeholders:
Figure 1: Participants by Role
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Figure 2: Participants per event and role
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The innovative peer-learning events concerned the following topics:
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What was the overall feedback on this new format?
Participants stressed the overall utility and value of discussing practical cases and learning from one another while they suggested that the exchange of material beforehand would be an advantage for an even more fruitful discussion.
Moreover, the peer-learning event has sparked many Member States to set up follow-up meetings to transfer additional practices in their specific contexts and deepen their mutual knowledge on the topics. To this extent, the peer-learning sessions facilitated the direct creation of channels of communication and contacts between evaluation stakeholders from across the Member States.
