title: Advocacy evaluation: what it is and where to find out more about it.
abstract: Advocacy and policy change have become increasingly important strategies in health promotion efforts. As a result, advocacy evaluation is emerging as a necessary competency for health promotion practitioners. This article introduces the growing field of advocacy evaluation by describing its typical features, which include using prospective evaluation designs, emphasizing real-time data collection and use, monitoring and responding to changing environmental conditions, and assessing both individual and organizational capacity building. A number of freely available resources for learning more about advocacy evaluation's key concepts and methods are highlighted.
authors.affiliation: Community Health Sciences, in the School of Public Health at the University of Illinois, Chicago, IL 60608-1260, USA. mfagen1@uic.edu
authors.forename: Michael C
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Fagen
authors.forename: Ehren
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Reed
authors.forename: Jackie Williams
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Kaye
authors.forename: Leonard
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Jack
mesh_terms: D003625:Data Collection / Q000379:methods; D004777:Environment; D006291:Health Policy; D006293:Health Promotion / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D015397:Program Evaluation / Q000379:methods*; D012922:Social Change