Category Archives: Blog Post
Feb
Coo-L’s cool..
Spring’s in the air, lots of interesting projects on the go, and OCR/Wildcard have just delivered the Coo-Levaluation report: lots of actionable feedback for Camden Council derived via workshops, interviews and an online survey. Always a delight to work on a project where the beneficiaries are so engaged and positive.
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Tagged | evaluation, interview, survey, workshop
Feb
Qualitative data analysis & techology
Computer aided qualitative data analysis? A conversation with a colleague today revealed that there is still resistance to technology in this field. Arguing that computer assisted qualitative data analysis is detrimental to ‘meaning’ is a little like saying that a telephone is detrimental to a conversation. The content is what matters, regardless of the tools you use to mine it. Computer aided qualitative data analysis (CAQDAS) doesn’t *have* to involve automation (though there are occasions where it can, and it’s helpful). Rather, it helps you systematically analyse large corpora of data (text, video, photos) without giving you RSI in the process. Taking some of the drudgery out of the analysis should enable you to pay even more attention to what your data actually “mean”, not to mention enabling you to track your logic systematically, thus helping you to justify your conclusions. The CAQDAS networking project at the University of Surrey is a great resource for this topic, providing independent reviews and comparisons of different software packages, in addition to training courses and methodological working papers. http://caqdas.soc.surrey.ac.uk/
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Jan
Free group and teamwork training for active citizenship
FREE Open College Network accredited training for voluntary organisations involved in youth & community work in the North West. The 1 day training is provided by ICA:UK and covers group and teamwork skills for supporting active citizenship. This funding expires in February. If you can convene a group of 10, contact amelia@ica-uk.org.uk by 5pm on Weds 2nd February 2011 to establish whether you qualify.
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Tagged | participation, training
Jan
The OCR blog – some tips
The ‘tags’ box on the right is a tag cloud – a visual index of the entire OCR site (at www.orlacronin.com, if you’re reading this via RSS. The bigger the font, the more often the word appears in the site, so it gives you a sense of our interests. Click on a word to find related material across the site.
Following the blog: if you’d like to keep up to date with our musings without having to keep visiting, use the RSS feed on the right of this page. Click the RSS icon and paste the URL into your preferred RSS reader (in Outlook, you can do this by clicking on your account settings, then the RSS tab, selecting ‘new’ and pasting the URL).
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Tagged | blog
Jan
Redefining corporate social responsibility?
Lots of talk at the moment about Michael Porter (he of the ‘Five Forces’ fame) & Mark Kramer (Harvard Business School) and their latest article in the Harvard Business Review regarding the relationship between economic and societal progress. ‘Shared Value’ is the new buzzphrase: “creating economic value in a way that also creates value for society, by reconceiving products and markets, redefining productivity and creating local clusters”.
Whether or not one accepts Porter’s assertions about the value of capitalism, his discourse is already being embraced by companies & governments, so it looks as though the concept, at least, will be with us for a while.
Listen to the interview on Radio 4 here
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Tagged | CSR, shared value
Jan
Welcome to the new website
Our old one was so dated you could almost see the cobwebs. It’s been a busy seven years – so busy, it’s taken us this this long to update the website! If you’re reading this via a RSS feed, we’re at the usual address: www.orlacronin.com. We’d be really grateful for your feedback on the new site. Click here (once you have opened the full blog post) to take part in a very short survey, or just add your comments/suggestions below.
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Tagged | Orla Cronin Research
Jan
OCR presenting at ICA:UK Annual Conference
We’ll be presenting a brief overview of our ‘Partners in Politics’ evaluation at the ICA:UK conference “Building strong communities through participation”. Bookings for the conference are still being accepted via the ICA:UK website.
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Tagged | evaluation, participation
Jan
Sport England Active Women
We’re delighted to have been appointed providers of the Monitoring and Evaluation training within the research consortium for Sport England’s ‘Active Women’ initiative. We will commence training at the Street Games conference in April. Click here for more information on ‘Active Women‘.
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Tagged | evaluation, gender, monitoring, training
Jan
Evaluation of Coo-L project
OCR, in conjunction with Helen Lynn of Wildcard Communications, have been appointed evaluators to London Borough of Camden’s COO-L (Choices and Opportunities Online) project.
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Tagged | evaluation, online survey, qualitative
Apr
International Sport for Development Platform
In collaboration with Alison Woodcock (RHUL), we completed our evaluation of the International Sport for Development Platform for the Swiss Academy for Development, and submitted our report to the board. We were heartened by the response of platform members to our online survey, and we were able to make strategic recommendations for the future of the platform based on solid evidence.
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Tagged | evaluation, online survey, sport for development, strategy