Evaluation Shapes Educational Quality

Despite attempting a good teaching and learning process, numerous problems sometimes affect teachers and students in several ways. In this context, an evaluation of the educational curriculum is required to understand the issues and address them with possible solutions.

The word evaluation is not confined to a narrow sense but to a wider one. According to Hadley and Mitchell, evaluation is required mainly for making decisions in three areas: course improvement, decisions about individuals, and administrative regulation. Course improvement decisions can be made based on the findings about instructional materials and methods. The Encyclopaedia of Evaluation stated evaluation as a process of collecting and synthesising information to enquire about the quality of programs, people, curriculum, policies, etc. There are some specific reasons behind evaluating any program. Evaluation of any program is undertaken mainly for the following reasons: examining effectiveness, communicating the status of the particular program to the stakeholders, and making decisions about the program regarding whether to continue, change, stop, or implement elsewhere.

Evaluation is examining or monitoring the program's status to improve its effectiveness. Evaluation plays a prominent role in knowing the program's status in terms of its functioning. According to Stufflebeam, evaluation is the systematic and continuing process that involves delineating queries to be responded to, obtaining relevant information, and providing the appropriate information to policymakers to decide on program effectiveness. The word evaluation is not confined to a narrow sense but to a wider one. According to the United Nations Development Programme, evaluation is a systematic and objective approach to knowing the program's status; it is not supposed to be attempted only once, but many times, according to the program's need to be evaluated. Moreover, it employs several assessments to achieve the outcome. The United Nations Evaluation of the program provides overall information about the resources intended to meet the program objectives. It serves to provide necessary feedback to improve the program or curriculum. Evaluation of the educational program gives the teachers an idea of the students' learning and achievement.

Learning achievement of students can be accessed through evaluation. Educational evaluation is mainly carried out for course improvement and decisions about instruction, teachers, students, and administrative regulation. The most commonly and widely used model for evaluating the program is the CIPP model. CIPP is an abbreviation of context, input, process, and product. The CIPP evaluation model tends to answer the four queries: what is it, and what should we do? How should we do it? Are we doing it correctly? And did it work to achieve goals? There are many models for evaluating educational programs; however, the CIPP evaluation model (1985) developed by Stufflebeam and Shinkfield has been widely practiced in academic research. The CIPP model developed by Stufflebeam evaluates the program based on four components: context, input, process, and product.

According to Stufflebeam, context evaluation means examining the context in terms of meeting the objective of the course that assesses needs, problems, and opportunities; input evaluation examines existing resources to meet objectives; process examines how the program is conducted and what kind of strategies are adopted to achieve the goal; and product examines the outcome of the program in terms of effectiveness, transportability, and sustainability.

The CIPP evaluation model is comprehensive and systematic and is the best approach to evaluate curriculum, books, or any training program in terms of feasibility, utility, accuracy, and propriety to make relevant decisions on the overall merits and demerits of the curriculum in the form of strengths and weaknesses. 

Curriculum is an instructional guideline for the whole academic content. It concerns how, what, and why teachers or instructors should teach to meet teaching and learning goals. It generally comprises assignments, tasks, exams, instructional methods, resources, and students' evaluation methods. It is mainly aimed at seeing the result of the study program as a product. Time and again, there is a need to evaluate the curriculum to know the specific course's effectiveness in meeting students' needs for physical, mental, and personal and professional development. Curriculum is an effort to know all the components that bring students' competencies to better adjust to personal, academic, experiential, and social life. It is designed to know educational aims, knowledge, skills, teaching and learning strategies, and resources that ensure the overall development of students.

Educational evaluation is vital in teaching and learning, as it improves educational quality. In addition, it is also essential for top management professionals like the rector, registrar, and principal, since it provides them with necessary feedback. Moreover, it brings interest and motivation among teachers and students towards the teaching and learning process; it is not only limited to learning achievement but also examines the input and process.

(The author is a visiting assistant professor at Kathmandu University School of Law and Engineering and a lecturer at Samriddhi College.)