Adaptation, evaluation and inclusion

In this article I reflect on a recent development currently shaping programme evaluation as field, which makes the case for evaluators facilitating evaluation training evaluees to self-evaluate and improve the programmes they teach. Fetterman argues persuasively that the practice was incipient in the field and required formalization and acceptance as framework in mainstream evaluation for the field to retain integrity. Its use widely across the globe, as well as in South Africa, prompts questions about the form it should take when adopted outside its country of origin. This is the focus of the article. As conceptualised at the time, Fetterman's evaluation framework is discussed to show its procedure and developmental stages. Used in a national pilot in South Africa in the early 2000s, the framework assisted implement 'inclusion' in state schools as it occurred, endeavouring, as in the US, to seamlessly move between implementation, gauging worth and further implementation, in one of three programmes in the pilot.