Responsibility for effective and efficient performance of programs. Measures of accountability focus on (1) benefits accruing from the program as valued by customers and supporters (2) how resources are invested and the results attained.

An attempt to keep the participants unknown to the people who use the evaluation and, if possible, to the investigators themselves.

Strengths, opportunities, valuable quality or thing.

The beliefs we have about the program, the participants, and the way we expect the program to operate; the principles that guide our work. Faulty assumptions may be the reason we don't achieve the expected outcomes.

Information about the situation or condition prior to a program or intervention.

Performance data used either as a baseline against which to compare future performance or as a marker of progress toward a goal.

A type of evaluation that seeks to determine the impacts of a collection of related projects on society as a whole. Cluster evaluation looks across a group of projects to identify issues and problems that affect an entire area of a program. Designed and used by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation to determine the effectiveness of its grant making.

An attempt to remove any elements that might indicate the subject's identity.

A type of evaluation that examines how the project functions within the economic, social, and political environment of its community and project setting.

Process to estimate the overall cost and benefit of a program or components within a program. Seeks to answer the question "Is this program or product worth its costs?" Or "Which of the options has the highest benefit/cost ratio?" This is only possible when all values can be converted into money terms.