Programme Evaluation - The Loughborough Partnership
The Loughborough Partnership are conducted the programme evaluation of the NOPES initiative across the UK. The partnership was an expert team led by the director of the Institute of Youth Sport and was drawn from the Centre for Research in Social Policy, the British Heart Foundation National Centre, the Institute for Sport and Leisure Policy and the Centre for Developing and Evaluating Lifelong Learning (CDELL). They were all based at Loughborough University apart from CDELL which was located at the University of Nottingham. The partnership also worked in collaboration with University of Wales, Bangor. The team offered:
A sophisticated understanding of the policy and organisational context within which the projects supported by the Fund operate
- Substantial experience within the team of the management of large scale projects
- Considerable expertise in evaluating similar projects
- A phased approach that generated robust quantitative and qualitative data
- A strong element of professional development for local authorities/lead organisations and individual project leaders to encourage reflective management practice
The programme evaluation concentrated upon three key dimensions:
- Partnership
- Participation
- Wider social change
The evaluation of the NOPES initiative was based upon a sound theoretical basis.
The evaluation included:
- Eleven core Case Study local authorities:
- 5 Local Education Authorities in England
- 2 Local Authorities in Scotland
- 2 Local Authorities in Wales
- 2 Education and Library Board areas in Northern Ireland
- Surveys which were used to collect quantitative data nationally on the impact of the NOPES initiative. Baseline and subsequent Annual Surveys were mainly used to measure changes in participation over time.
- Seven Fast Track Projects which were designed to provide examples of effective practice and demonstrate innovative approaches or designs. The emphasis of this aspect of the evaluation was on assessing the scope for Fast Track Projects to offer best practice models for later, main-track projects.
- In addition to the main case studies, a number of Telephone Case Studies were conducted. These enabled the evaluation team to monitor the implementation practices in a more diverse range of local settings.
