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Program Evaluation and Administrative Statistical Analysis

PA 5312 — Texas State University, Master of Public Administration Dr. W. Scott Langford, Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science

This is the online companion to the PA 5312 graduate seminar. It teaches program evaluation as a practical, decision-oriented craft: how to ask whether a public or nonprofit program actually works, how to estimate its effects credibly, and how to communicate the evidence honestly to the people who make decisions. Analysis is done in Microsoft Excel, building on the statistical foundation from PA 5311.

Chapters

  1. Introduction to Program Evaluation
  2. Program Theory and Logic Models
  3. Evaluation Questions, Designs, and Causal Inference
  4. Measurement and Data Collection
  5. Describing and Comparing Data
  6. Process and Implementation Evaluation
  7. Regression for Evaluation
  8. Quasi-Experimental Designs and Difference-in-Differences
  9. Interrupted Time Series and Regression Discontinuity
  10. Randomized Controlled Trials
  11. Cost-Benefit and Cost-Effectiveness Analysis
  12. Communicating Findings, Ethics, and the Evaluation Report

Datasets

See the Datasets page for the Texas data we use to practice evaluation methods, including a county political/socioeconomic panel and a city finance panel.

How to Use This Site

  1. Read the assigned chapter before the weekly seminar.
  2. Work the chapter’s techniques in Excel using the linked datasets.
  3. Bring questions and critiques to class — this is a seminar.