I offer a brief excursion through the history of program evaluation and, in particular, through the major issues regarding the purposes that program evaluation serves and the various forms that program evaluation takes in serving these purposes. Probably the most important fact to keep in mind is that program evaluation has not historically been commonly used in most sectors of society. Talk has been cheap when it comes to thoughtful and systematic program evaluation. There has been a fair amount of conversation about this type of assessment work in an organization, but it has not often actually been enacted. In the past, much of the work done in this area was confined to educational programs and, in particular, to the evaluation of programs for funding purposes or for continuing accreditation or authorization. Many of the advances in evaluation were made by members of or consultants to major philanthropic foundations (such as the W. K. Kellogg Foundation and the Lilly Endowment) or the United States Federal government who were asked to determine the worth of a program that has been funded or may be funded by their institution. Other advances have been made by those given the task to determine if a school or college should be granted a specific accreditation status.

Program evaluation has also been widely used in the sciences, criminal justice, medicine and social welfare, once again often associated with the assessment of program worth by governmental funding agencies. Following Sputnik, increasing attention was given to the achievements of American research initiatives, while attention also increased regarding the success of heavily-funded social programs under the banners of “The Great Society” and “War on Poverty.” In more recent years, program evaluation has become more common within corporations and nonprofit organizations and in health care delivery systems. In most cases, this growing interest is unrelated to outside funding sources; rather, it emerges from a growing concern about quality products and services, and the growing concern about assessing costs and benefits associated with specific program offerings. Return-on-investment is now a commonly used (though often misunderstood and misused) frame of reference for corporate program evaluation. Similarly, in health care, “evidence-based” medicine has emerged as a way to determine treatment strategies and funding priorities.