Abstract
Professional organizations have a responsibility for program evaluation. This paper describes a method and reports evaluative data from 4 annual pediatric meetings. Three components were assessed: a general plenary session, special topic sessions, and workshops. Data from 2,008 evaluations were analyzed. General and special topic presentations were assessed for the following factors: method, appropriateness, organization, quality of visual aides, and adequacy of data base. Special topic sessions were also evaluated for: over-all quality, performance of the moderator, and opportunity for discussion. Workshop content was evaluated using 3 factors: quality, currentness, and relevance. Assessment of participant satisfaction was based on the following 9 descriptives: rewarding, encouraging, educational, should be repeated, organized, helpful, at participant's level, met participant's needs, and group orientation. Content evaluation was also accomplished by evaluator identification of major points made by the presenter or workshop leader.
General and special topic presentations were judged “good” with an average score of 3.0 based on a scale of 1 (poor) to 4 (excellent). Workshop satisfaction and content were both judged “good” with respective average scores of 3.9 and 4.0 on a scale of 1 (poor) to 5 (excellent). Results are being used to effect changes in abstract selection, performance of participants, planning future conventions, and improvements in evaluation method.
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Comerei, G., Cohen, M., Preece, E. et al. THE ANNUAL MEETING: A FOUR YEAR STUDY. Pediatr Res 11, 376 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1203/00006450-197704000-00039
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1203/00006450-197704000-00039
