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Current Challenges in Impact Evaluation

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Notes

  1. But not ironically on the NGO, which implemented the pilot study used for the evaluation; see Roetman (2011).

  2. Specifically, studies were excluded if the treatment group were concurrently treated for schistosomiasis unless the control group was also being treated for schistosomiasis.

  3. Such a review is currently underway; see the protocol of Welch et al (2014).

  4. It is also worth noting that the intervention was conducted in NGO schools. In government schools, unions would likely resist both the monitoring and the change in their terms and conditions, and thus there is limited external validity to the study.

  5. The exchange occurred during a presentation at the Public Health Foundation of India, New Delhi; personal communication from Radhika Menon.

  6. And doing so raises many intellectual challenges as I found when applying this approach in studies on education (World Bank, 2004, 2005), health (World Bank, 2006) and rural electrification (World Bank, 2007). For example, there is no consensus, nor even much literature, on valuing fertility reduction.

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White, H. Current Challenges in Impact Evaluation. Eur J Dev Res 26, 18–30 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1057/ejdr.2013.45

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