A collaborative approach to program evaluation of community-based teen pregnancy prevention projects

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate a model for collaboration between program providers and program evaluators. The article describes how university-based evaluators, a state health department, and local program providers collaborated to evaluate 12 projects implementing commercially developed teenage pregnancy prevention (TPP) programs in school settings. Approximately 2,200 students participate annually in the programs. Program evaluation staff and local program providers worked together to construct logic models that helped guide the intervention and evaluation design. The local providers also participated in training sessions, conducted by the evaluation team, to increase their understanding and skills related to program evaluation methods. Student-level outcomes related to knowledge, attitudes, skills, behaviors, as well as an assessment of curricula fidelity were included in the evaluation. The result of this collaborative model has been a quality program evaluation for the projects while maintaining community input regarding program improvements that reflect local population needs.