Professionalization of Program Evaluation: A Comparative Mixed Methods Case Study of Canada and the United States

Abstract

Professionalization of evaluation means different things to different people across the globe. This study explored the professionalization of program evaluation in Canada and the United States of America (US) using sociological models of professionalism as the guiding framework for assessing the level of maturity of program evaluation as a field of professional practice. Five concepts identified by the model were used to develop a professionalism assessment tool for program evaluators (PAToPE) to measure the behavioral attributes of professionalism: professional autonomy, expertise, ethical dispositions, innovation and research, and credentialing. Data for the study were collected using a sequential mixed-methods approach starting with interviews of 27 evaluators and a test of the measurement instrument in an online survey to a random sample of 1,000 American Evaluation Association (AEA) members and 573 Canadian Evaluation Society (CES) members from the 2017 membership directory. The results of the study suggest that credentialing is the major difference between Canada and the US and that Canada is perceived to be more advanced in the professionalization of evaluation than the US. The empirical information also suggests that program evaluators demonstrate professionalism differently by country, place of work, gender, credentialed evaluator status, level of skills, level of education, age, and years of evaluation practice. The study concludes with implications and recommendations for professional associations, evaluation practice, and future studies.