I thought I’d do something a little different this month and point out a few resources to those of you who are interested in either starting to examine your ADR programs or are thinking about how to expand or improve current efforts to evaluate program effectiveness.
Demographics
There has been a push lately to have courts collect demographic information from parties, particularly race and ethnicity, so that courts can better understand and address inequities in service provision. In that vein, the National Center for State Courts has published “Collecting Race and Ethnicity Data.” This is a short report that provides helpful information on the standards for collecting such information, things to think about when planning to collect it and how you may want to customize race and ethnicity categories to best fit the community you serve.
Model Surveys
Demographics are also included in the Model Surveys created by RSI and the American Bar Association Section of Dispute Resolution. But that’s only one part of what you’ll find in our packet. The Model Surveys include questions you should ask on any mediation program survey, as well as instructions about how to customize the surveys for your particular program.
Guide to Program Success
If you’re looking for more extensive information on how to monitor and evaluate your program, RSI has included two chapters in our Guide to Program Success that step you through tracking your program and conducting evaluations. In Chapter 11, “Design a System to Track Your Program,” you’ll learn how to decide what to track, what data will be needed from what sources in order to do so, and more. Chapter 15, “Evaluate Your Program,” dives into everything you need to know about how to do a full program evaluation.
