A student information system is needed for program evaluation. An essential principle in all program evaluation is that good evaluation requires valid and reliable data. In evaluating outreach programs accurate information is needed on the numbers of students participating in programs and the benefits that accrue to these students from the services provided. Students may participate in more than one program, either concurrently or sequentially. Program goals and intended outcomes must be defined.
Evaluators ask questions about specific sets of desired social ends.
Before answering, or even asking, these questions, we must determine the ends we wish to achieve. This may seem an obvious point, but in most policy domains the answer is far from clear. Such is the case with higher education outreach programs. Though most observers would agree that the ultimate goal of outreach programs is for students to attend and complete college, an evaluation strategy that focuses exclusively on the outcome of college completion would be extremely limited. The reason for this is that college completion sits near the end of a long chain of actions students must undertake beginning long before they are even able to apply to college.