Tools for Formative Evaluation: Gathering the Information Necessary for Program Improvement

New Extension educators experience a steep learning curve when attempting to develop effective Extension programs. Formative evaluation is helpful to new, and experienced, Extension educators in determining the changes necessary for making programs more effective. Formative evaluation is an essential part of program evaluation. However, its use has been overlooked by Extension educators due to overemphasis on outcomes evaluation for accountability. Extension educators must develop evaluation tools with questions appropriate for determining program weaknesses and strengths and identifying changes necessary for improvement. This article describes how to develop formative evaluation questions for program improvement

Making Evaluation Work for You: Ideas for Deriving Multiple Benefits from Evaluation

Increased demand for accountability has forced Extension educators to evaluate their programs and document program impacts. Due to this situation, some Extension educators may view evaluation simply as the task, imposed on them by administrators, of collecting outcome and impact data for accountability. They do not perceive evaluation as a useful tool in Extension programming and, therefore, pay little or no attention to it. The purpose of this article is to describe how to integrate evaluation into Extension programming to gain all the benefits evaluation offers. These benefits include program improvement, monitoring, and marketing and Extension advocacy

A Multi-Modal Public Transport Solution For Male, Maldives

Male, the island capital of the Maldives, an archipelago of over 1000 islands in the Indian Ocean faces chronic traffic congestion. This 2 sq km island is home to over 100,000 people. There is a taxi service comprising of around 450 vehicles and a dhoni (ferry) service amounting to over 100 vessels to neighbouring islands. Male, which is fast becoming a small urban centre faces typical peak period traffic issues. The vehicle fleet is dominated by motor cycles which still contribute to traffic congestion in narrow streets. The taxi system which comprises of individually owned taxis registered with a ‘call centre’, provide limited services but fails during peak demand periods especially on rainy days. There is very little coordination between the ferry and taxi services. The paper is based on the results of a detailed urban transport planning study carried out in Male Urban Area which included passenger interviews, vehicle counts and travel time surveys covering all modes of motorized and non-motorized travel. This paper investigates the introduction of a mini-bus transport system that would provide easy transfers between ferries and major traffic generators and attractors. The contribution of a mini-bus service in the long-term is also discussed with respect to implementation of traffic demand management measures. This paper discuses the most appropriate type of vehicle that could be used and the potential framework for ownership and management of such a system taking in to consideration the multi-modal connectivity and also the service parameters for the operation of a successful minibus service. The paper also analyses the present operation of the ferry services and investigates its ownership and operation parameters for efficiency and cost effectiveness. The paper reports reasons for the varied efficiencies seen on the different routes and the impact the informal and loosely regulated service providers have on the key performance indicators of these services. It also compares cost between different ferry services and studies the relationship between the ownership structure, technology levels, productivity and fare.Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies. Faculty of Economics and Business. The University of Sydne

Optimal Bus Dispatching Policy Under Variable Demand Over Time And Route Length

The problems of scheduling and schedule co-ordination in bus operations have conflicting objectives related to user’s cost and operator’s cost. Passengers would like to have public bus services where there is less waiting time. Operators on the other hand would like to earn profit with lesser vehicle operating cost and a minimum number of buses. In developing countries where overloading of buses has long been considered necessary to ensure bus travel remains affordable to most socioeconomic groups, bus operators would in addition to larger headways, like to have higher load factors to increase revenue even though passengers would prefer less load factors as it provides a more comfortable journey. All these factors are further constrained by the fare levels, which may not make the revenue adequate to operate at the most economically optimal frequency and load factor. This paper considers a method that is an extension to Newell’s Optimal Dispatching Policy, to determine a fleet size and dispatching rate based on both operator’s cost and user’s cost including the disutility of standing, in order to arrive at a global cost optimum. It further investigates the financial viability of providing such a service and sets out a financial viability domain within which optimization can occur in practice. If the resulting dispatching rate is lower and does not fall within the domain of financial viability, then operating subsidies are considered necessary to maintain the economically optimum dispatching rate. This method to compute optimized dispatching rates is based on screen-line counts across given locations along a bus routes used in conjunction with a limited sample of on-board boarding and alighting surveys. Passenger revenues have been computed by a process of multiplication of the rationalized origin-destination matrix by the fare for distance travelled between the respective origins and destinations. Indicators have also been developed to determine average trip lengths for each route and average revenue per passenger together with the points of maximum capacity along the route. These indicators describe the nature of the demand that the bus route serves. The screen line counts provide the hourly variation in demand over a bus route throughout the day, which has been expressed in terms of a polynomial equation to determine the variation of demand over different time periods. By combining both functions, a composite function has been developed to determine; the daily passenger demand on a given route; the total revenue for operators, the average load factor and locations on the route where maximum loading occurs.Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies. Faculty of Economics and Business. The University of Sydne

Impact Evaluation of Integrated Extension Programs: Lessons Learned from the Community Gardening Program

Integrated programming is a coordinated Extension approach to address multi-faceted community issues. An integrated Extension approach is needed to address complex community issues in a meaningful way. Planning, implementation, and evaluation of an integrated program should be considered as a joint effort by the partnering Extension agents. This article describes how to document the impacts of integrated Extension program to reflect the coordinated effort of the Extension team. Documentation as well as sharing impacts with the partners is necessary to strengthen the collaboration and sustain the integrated Extension programming effort

Shallow Water Hydrodynamic Investigation Of Local Scour Over Smooth And Rough Sediment Beds

Over the recent years, a number of studies in nearshore sediment transport have been researched but a greater understanding of soil-hydrodynamic interaction has still paramount importance. A series of 2D small-scale physical experiments were performed at the University of East London (UEL) hydraulics laboratory to investigate the influence of flow and sediment properties on soil scour. Measured sediment and flow data were used to develop a simple empirical relationship for scour rate of each crescent zone with the help of dimensional analysis and best-fit technique under smooth bed condition. The proposed paper discusses the extended investigation on soil-hydrodynamic behaviour by increasing the mobile bed roughness to greater values used in earlier experiments by the authors to better understand sediment particle sorting mechanism and their spreading characteristics during scour. Eventually, the proposed experimental work will lead to the comparison, calibration and development of predictive curves of scour rate for different soils of each developing crescent zones

Landowners\u27 Knowledge, Attitudes, and Aspirations Towards Woody Biomass Markets in North Carolina

Non-industrial private forest (NIPF) landowners are often not included in discussions of emerging woody biomass markets for energy, yet they will likely be principal suppliers of the resource. Surveys administered to 475 forest landowners before and after an Extension Forestry education program in 10 counties across North Carolina indicated that landowners have low knowledge levels of woody biomass. However, as a result of participating in the training, landowners increased knowledge, had more positive attitudes, and developed aspirations to harvest woody biomass on their land. Extension professionals can use our training model to develop similar woody biomass educational programs

Normative Findings for Periocular Anthropometric Measurements among Chinese Young Adults in Hong Kong

Measurement of periocular structures is of value in several clinical specialties including ophthalmology, optometry, medical and clinical genetics, oculoplastic surgery, and traumatology. Therefore we aimed to determine the periocular anthropometric norms for Chinese young adults using a noninvasive 3D stereophotography system. Craniofacial images using the 3dMDface system were acquired for 103 Chinese subjects (51 males and 52 females) between the ages of 18 and 35 years. Anthropometric landmarks were identified on these digital images according to standard definitions, and linear distances between these landmarks were calculated. It was found that ocular measurements were significantly larger in Chinese males than females for intercanthal width, biocular width, and eye fissure lengths. No gender differences were found in the eye fissure height and the canthal index which ranged between 43 and 44. Both right and left eye fissure height-length ratios were significantly larger in females. This is the first study to employ 3D stereophotogrammetry to create a database of anthropometric normative data for periocular measurements. These data would be useful for clinical interpretation of periocular pathology and serve as reference values when planning aesthetic and posttraumatic surgical interventions

Spectroscopic observations of novae V1065 CEN and V1280 SCO using 45 cm cassegrain telescope at Arthur C Clarke Institute

The spectroscopic observations of two novae namely V1065 CEN and V1280 SCO were made by 45 cm Cassegrain telescope in high resolution ($\lambda/\delta\lambda$=22000) at H$\alpha$ (6563 \r{A}) region. V1065 CEN is He/N-type spectra which characterize a broad (Gaussian FWHM 49 \r{A}), saddle shaped and asymmetric H$\alpha$ emission line without prominent P-Cyg absorption component. Completely different H$\alpha$ profile of V1280 SCO shows prominent P-Cyg absorption and narrow emission line (Gaussian FWHM 26 \r{A}) which can be classified as Fe II type nova. The expansion velocities of these two systems measured from the minima of the P-Cyg profiles are close to 2300 km/s for V1065 CEN, and 716 km/s for V1280 SCO. Based on the photometric analysis, the Nova V1065 CEN can be classified as fast (11$<$t${_2}$$<$25) nova. The derived absolute magnitudes at maximum for nova V1065 CEN to be M$_{o,V}$ = -7.58$\pm$0.18 and M$_{o,B}$= -7.75$\pm$0.25 correspond to a distance 8.51$\pm$0.33 kpc. The parameters t$_{2V}$=12 days and t$_{3V}$=14 days of nova V1280 SCO determine that the nova is in between very fast and fast nova. The mean absolute magnitude at maximum is calculated to be M$_{o,V}$=-8.7$\pm$0.1 and the estimated distance to the nova V1280 SCO is 3.2$\pm$0.2 kpc

Characteristics and Motivational Factors of Effective Extension Advisory Leaders: Implications for Building Strong Extension Advisory Councils

The purpose of this study was to determine the characteristics and motivational factors of effective Extension advisory leaders. This Delphi study was conducted with a selected group of County Extension Directors and a group of Extension State Advisory Leaders. The study identified 10 characteristics that distinguish an effective Extension advisory leader. Some of these characteristics are explicit and easy to observe, while others are implicit and difficult to directly observe. Therefore, it is practical to use directly observable characteristics of effective advisory leaders when selecting volunteers. Once potential volunteers are spotted in the community, implicit characteristics of effective advisory leaders should be used to further screen them before they are selected. The study also identified the eight most important factors motivating individuals to volunteer as effective advisory leaders. Understanding these motivational factors is helpful for creating an environment for attracting and retaining effective volunteers. Understanding their motivation for volunteer work and creating an environment for them to meet the motivating factors for volunteering will lead to volunteer satisfaction and retention. The findings of this study can be used to build strong Extension advisory councils