The Strategy of Toothbrushing Programme Implemented In the UK - Report Example

EVALUATION STRATEGY ON TOOTH BRUSHING PROGRAMME IMPLEMENTED IN UK Evaluations approach and rationale Introduction Oral health can be identified as one of the fundamental elements that are increasingly becoming critical to the promotion of health among school going children. The development of programmes aimed at enhancing oral health continues to gain popularity among many schools. The basic approach that is utilised in promoting oral health is tooth brushing; which is simple and can be easily encouraged among school children. This has been the fundamental purpose why tooth brushing has been utilised as an approach of encouraging children to maintain proper oral health. Tooth brushing programmes across different schools have sought to ensure that the children become familiar with the basic tooth brushing practice as an approach for maintaining oral health. Evaluation of the programme implemented to improve oral health is critical in seeking to measure the effectiveness and delivery of the programme within many schools. The methods The effectiveness and the delivery aspects of the tooth brushing programme must be evaluated properly in seeking to ensure that the implementation objectives of the project have been achieved. Making an evaluation of the project will enhance the element of understanding the existing weaknesses in seeking to make changes that could improve the delivery of the project (Mertens & Wilson, 2012). It is through the evaluation that existing problems within the implementation process of the programme can be identified. An effective evaluation approach must be adopted to ensure that the various aspects of the effectiveness are sufficiently assessed to establish their impact upon the programme (Leech & Onwuegbuzie, 2009). Various methods will be utilised in collection of data that will be used in establishing the effectiveness of the programme. Different data collection methods will be utilised to establish the performance of the projects. The evaluation process will utilize a participatory approach to ensure that all the involved stakeholders are engaged in the evaluation process. The stakeholders will be able to identify the various elements of the projects which stakeholders perceive to have caused significant challenges to the implementation process. The information gathered from the stakeholders will be critical in making conclusions of the evaluation process. The involvement of different stakeholders in the evaluation process will ensure that the proposed changes become accepted as having come from the stakeholders (Bhopal, 2008). Recommendations of the evaluation will be likely to be adopted since the input of different stakeholders will have been included within the context of undertaking an evaluation. The utilization of the participatory approach will be critical in ensuring that there are feeling of ownership to the project evaluation despite the recommendations which will be made. This will be important in ensuring successful implementation of a strong base interventions within the schools aimed at correcting the various attributes which will be identified as not functioning effectively. These interventions will be perceived as belonging to the people once they are adopted and the individuals will be supportive because of their input in the interventions. Through the participations of different stakeholders, the credibility of the evaluation becomes enhanced as the report will be presenting the views of different individuals. Many pitfalls which would not have been identified using other methods are identified. This is because the approach uses the individuals as the source of information and enables getting factual information rather than theoretical information. The participatory approach will provide the evaluators with critical quantitative and qualitative information that can be utilized in making comparisons of different programme parameter in several schools (Baxter & Jack, 2008). The various stakeholders whose participation will be considered will be selected randomly to ensure representativeness of the programme and other schools. Through the participation, rich data will be collected in a manner that many other data elements cannot. The comparison conducted using participatory approach is based on different parts of the same project rather than comparing the project with another project that might have been implemented in a different country and location, as this might have had different objectives. This is mainly premised on evaluations based on the objectives of the programme. The environment in which the programme has been implemented presents complex aspects that could have a significant effect upon the programme and these would be properly understood through participatory approach based evaluation. The sampling process, when collecting the data, will involve different approaches based on the data required. During the initial stage of the site selection, random sampling will be utilised in selection of the schools upon which the evaluation will be conducted (Creswell, 2009). In seeking to establish the people who will be among the participants within the research, convenience sampling techniques will be utilised. The availability of students and teachers within the selected schools will be the basis upon which the convenience of sampling will be applied. Convenience sampling will ensure that those individuals who are within the vicinity and willing to participate will be allowed to participate (Ivan, Visoiu, & Palalghita, 2007). While the participatory approach has been adopted in evaluating the projects other methods can also be utilized. These would be essential in eliminating the time which participant approach takes to undertake. Some of these other approaches have become increasingly questionable in their effectiveness in gathering factual data from the participants. The involvement of stakeholders ensures that this approaches presents factual information which other methods might not be able to get. While other methods might be easier to undertake, they cannot be chosen in this case because the participation of the stakeholders remains essential in determining the necessary changes which should be adopted. The significant elements of the programme implementation regarding effectiveness will be analysed independently in each of the schools in order to enhance the comparison at a later stage. Once all the cases have been completed, and data properly formulated the assessment and comparison of the case will be undertaken. This will be focused at comparison of the delivery and achievements of the programme in the different locations where case studies were conducted (Dale, Wiele, & Iwaarden, 2013). The researchers will establish themes that develop form the findings presented in order to use them in making comparisons and subsequent evaluations of the entire programme. The sequence of implementing the programme and the achievement which have been attained over the time will be key elements which will be utilised in making evaluations based on the information presented in the case studies. Theoretical reasons can be established in seeking to explain some of the observed results of the intervention upon the various schools where implementation of the programme occurred. Selecting appropriate outcome indicators The process of evaluation seeks to measure the effectiveness and delivery of the project objectives across the different schools where the programme has been adopted. The evaluation will be undertaken based on the established programme objectives to determine the changes and deviations which can be observed (Stufflebeam & Shinkfield, 2007). Significance of the evaluation will be focused on evaluating the changes that have occurred in the aspect of improving oral health. This will also include determination of the behavioural changes upon the school children as a result of the programme having being implemented. This evaluation will be based on the results recorded in the case studies. The outcomes of the programme will be critical indicators of the effectiveness in the process of implementing the programme. The goals of the programme include improvement of orals health, and this has various elements which can be utilised as indicators. Generally the perception of the participants can determine this aspects, but quantitative data regarding oral health would enhance the findings and conclusions. The qualitative data would be critical in enhancing the validation of the indicators used in establishing attainment of oral health improvement. Increased support from the participants becomes a fundamental indicator towards the benefits presented by the programme to the target population. Impact evaluation will be utilised to establish the effectiveness of the programme in improving oral health. This can be effectively measured through establishing some long terms measures like reduction in the number of oral health related complications occurring among children. This would include tooth decays, which are increasingly common among children. The improvement of oral health would be expected to reduce such problems making this an indicator of success in the implementation of the programme. Other aspects that can be utilised in establishing the impact of the programme might include the change in awareness among the children regarding tooth brushing, knowledge and skills gained through the project. In seeking to establish the effectiveness and delivery aspects process indicators would be critical in understanding these elements. This can be established through determining the perception of the people regarding the implementation of tooth brushing programme. This will be critical in establishing the support accorded to the programme while relating this to the number of active participants in the programme. The activity of people in participating through the programme becomes an indicator of a programme which is deemed beneficial to the participants. Assessing processes This is the process of assessing the elements related to critical success of the programme through the implementation process. This will be a continuous process through which the programme will continue in its lifetime. This is mainly aimed at establishing the fidelity of the programme. The process of implementation will be assessed on the basis of the participants and desired procedures of implementation (Patton, 2011). Since the project is generally aimed at being implemented in schools, the target population will be the school children. The number of students participating in the programme will be critical in assessing the implementation process of the programme. This will be critical in evaluating the challenges that face the participants during the programme implementation. Identification of the challenges will enable the stakeholders to define the improvement which can be undertaken upon the programme. The role played by the teachers will also be assessed in seeking to ascertain the impact of their contribution. The implementation process will be assessed in terms of the various functions and roles that the students and teachers perform in relation to actualizing the objectives of the programmer. Different forms of training that have been undertaken prior to the implementation of the programme will be assessed to establish the forms of training that will be critical to providing the participants with essential skills, which are the aims of the program (McDavid, Huse, & Hawthorn, 2012). This will be fundamental in making conclusive assessment of the effectiveness of processes which have been applied in enhancing the functionality of the programmer towards achieving the objectives. Evaluation evidence into practice A theoretical approach seeking to establish the basis for implementation will be critical towards making recommendations based on the factual information gathered through the research (Spaulding, 2008). Various theories will be critical to the assessment of the conditions surrounding the programme in seeking to establish efficiency and delivery of the objectives. The analysis of the comparative information will be undertaken based on the established indicators of success. These indicators will be used as the fundamental measures for making comparison with the objectives to determine effectiveness of the programme. Consideration of the processes utilised in implementing the project will be critical to ascertaining the relevant measures of effectiveness which can be applied within this context. Objective recommendations will be made based on the data gathered without bias. These recommendations will be developed upon consideration of the gathered information and application of the evaluative measures designed to appraise the programme outcome at a given stage. The recommendations will be aimed at communicating to the policy makers and healthcare providers, the critical aspects of the programme which are essential to the successful implementation process (Vedung, 2008). Consideration of these recommendations by the policy makers could be critical in the improvement of the project and achievement of the objectives. Since the researchers will not have interests in the programme, the recommendations will be objective and aimed at achieving the overall welfare of the project stakeholders. A report will be published on the evaluations for the different stakeholders to be able to understand the findings of the evaluations. This will seeks to communicate some important elements of the programme to the stakeholders in seeking to enhance their understanding (Langbein & Felbinger, 2006). Projects are commonly faced by challenges related to the failure by some involved individuals to understand the fundamental concepts around a programme. Through the evaluations some other benefits of the projects can be presented for the community members to increase their understanding of the process. Since the objectives will be utilised in developing the indicators, they will also become clear to the various stakeholders. Stakeholders can always make reference to the report to understand the different aspects of the programme. References Baxter, P., & Jack, S. (2008). Qualitative case study methodology: Study design and implementation for novice researchers. 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