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Editorial: EvalPartners Announced Call for Proposals for Small Grants

One of the key values that drives EvalPartners is a belief that VOPEs must play a key role in influencing and enhancing the demand for evaluation and the use of evaluation results; in developing the capacity of national and local authorities, as well as communities, NGOs, academia and the private sector, to endorse and support evaluations of their own policies and programs.

In July EvalPartners has opened two new funding opportunities for VOPEs: the call for Small Grants proposals and Equity and Gender Innovation Challenge. Small Grants Program aims to support the launch of the Global Evaluation Agenda 2016-2020 and stimulate VOPEs thinking and activities contributing to results in six broad thematic areas: gender, youth/emerging evaluators, culture, SDGs and professionalization of evaluation.

Gender and Equity Innovation Challenge is open to innovative VOPE initiatives that look at evaluations that have made a positive difference with equity and gender policy. We are particularly interested in encouraging ideas that bring stakeholders together across national boundaries and in particular collaborative bids which involve both evaluators and users of evaluation outputs.

Marco Segone and Natalia Kosheleva, Co-chairs

2015 Evaluation Torch Lit at Mexican Evaluation Week

Mexico joined the International Evaluation Year celebrations with more than 80 activities throughout the country to promote monitoring and evaluation capacities. The Evaluation Torch was lit by Claudia Maldonado, CLEAR Latin America - General Coordinator; Juan Manuel Valle, Executive Director of the Mexican Agency for International Cooperation and Development; Gonzalo Hernández Licona, Executive Director of the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy; and Gustavo Ulloa, Director General for Evaluation of Program Results at the Ministry of Finance. Please visit the website for further information regarding the activities.

Government of Nepal Takes Leadership in Evaluation

Nepal will be the host country for the Global Evaluation Week where International Year of Evaluation will be celebrated as a culmination of more than 76 events around the world. Nepal has taken very important decisions regarding evaluation in the country: The government has decided to declare  EvalYear 2015 and include evaluation in government policy and programs as a main agenda; there will be separate budget code for evaluation and monitoring at the national level; the new Nepal constitution will have an article on evaluation; Nepal is organizing a networking meeting with all stakeholders on 29 July for preparations in celebrating EvalYear 2015. We hope this is a milestone in the history of evaluation for promoting evaluation culture.

ANZEA Joined EvalYear at Its Annual Conference in Auckland

The Aotearoa New Zealand Evaluation Association (ANZEA) held its annual conference from 6-9 July in Auckland, New Zealand. Evaluators from different communities in New Zealand, Pacific Islands and international participants attended the conference. There were program streams for Maori, Pacific community and general. It was an opportunity for different communities to have a dialogue and share their evaluation experience. At the conference all participants joined EvalYear by reading out the pledge and also lit the Evaluation Torch. Most importantly the Maori Evaluation Association (The first ever aboriginal evaluation society) was launched at the conference.

French Version of the VOPE Institutional Development Toolkit Launched

Good news for the French-speaking VOPEs is the launch of the French version of the VOPE Institutional Development Toolkit developed by IOCE/EvalPartners for strengthening of VOPEs. This Toolkit is designed to support the emergence and development of the VOPEs as well as the fulfillment of their mission. Whether VOPEs are emerging or already established, leaders of VOPEs may find within the package multiple sources of inspiration drawn from the practices and experiences accumulated by multiple VOPEs working in the four corners of the planet. You are invited to watch the webinar of the launch.

It is also important to note that 3 RFE volunteers contributed since 2013 to the regular work of this group of EvalPartners (Christian Bordeleau, Raymond Gervais, Ann Royer) and that an ad hoc RFE working group has contributed over a period of 18 months to the implementation of the French-language component of this Toolkit (Andrealisa Belzer, Marie Gervais, Marie-Claude Jean, Miché Ouédraogo). This Toolkit is interactive and scalable. The addition of new documents developed by VOPEs are therefore strongly encouraged. 

ECG Members Lit the Evaluation Torch

The Evaluation Torch to celebrate the International Year of Evaluation was lit on 30th June by Evaluation Cooporation Group (ECG) members at the meeting held at the Headquarters of the World Bank’s Independent Evaluation Group in Washington DC. ECG members include the Directors of Evaluation of the following multilateral banks/organizations: World Bank Group; African Development Bank; Asian Development Bank; Interamerican Development Bank; Islamic Development Bank; European Bank for Reconstruction and Development; European Investment Bank; Black Sea Trade and Development Bank; IMF; IFAD, GEF and UNEG Chair.