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Our training workshops are available to commission - they can be commissioned and delivered to a group of staff within a single organisation, either in-person or online. Intermediaries, funders and local authorities can also commission us to run workshops for their members or funded organisations.

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Online workshop 

Evaluating Prevention

evaluating prevention workshop
Date/timeThursday 12th November 2026, 10.00 am – 1.00 pm
LocationOnline (Zoom)
Cost£99.00 incl VAT
Book now

Prevention work is challenging and complex – evaluating the difference this work makes can be especially difficult.

There are many questions to consider: what is prevention, exactly? How do you evaluate something that hasn’t happened? How do you know which intervention made the difference in the long term?

While there are no magic answers, this workshop will provide practical tips and tools on how to tackle the challenge. See our Evaluating Prevention resource for more information.

At this workshop you will learn to:

  • Clarify what you’re preventing and for whom
  • Identify protective factors to generate positive outcomes
  • Use the above to create a theory of change
  • Use evidence to report on prevention activities

Who is this event for?

Staff or volunteers from third sector organisations working in Scotland or for the benefit of Scottish communities.

Pre-existing knowledge of evaluation is not essential but would be helpful. We advise attending our workshop Getting Started: Outcomes and Indicators or Let’s Evaluate! Lite before attending any other workshop, to ensure you have a good understanding of outcomes and indicators. This is important, as outcomes and indicators are the building blocks of evaluation!

Important note:

This workshop provides a brief overview of the main principles involved in self-evaluation before focussing on evaluating prevention in particular. If you are looking for full training in the principles and practices of evaluation, the Let’s Evaluate! programme will be more suitable.

Joining Information:

We are running this workshop using Zoom. We’ll email in advance with a link, password and all the materials you will need for the workshop. For more information, please read our Participant guide for using Zoom.

How our workshops run:

There will be a mixture of PowerPoint presentation and trainer guided exercises. We’ll help you learn from other participants and apply the learning to your work. There will be an icebreaker exercise at the start of the day to get to know each other. Participants will be placed in small groups to complete group activities.

For an engaging learning environment, we expect all attendees to actively participate in our workshops and to commit their full attention to the whole session. Please read our digital etiquette and best practice for online events.

About our workshops:

We are accessible. We use plain English. We work in a way that meets the different needs and abilities of people and organisations. We ask you if you have any access needs when we work with you and ensure that, as far as possible, we meet them.  Please ask us if you want to see our equalities policy.

Got any questions?

We’re here to help! Contact us for help and advice.

Book your place on this workshop by completing the form below:

Led by

Image of Shona Wells

Shona Watts

Senior Training Officer

About Shona

Shona joined ESS in February 2017. She spent many years prior to this working and volunteering in various areas of the third sector including youth work, criminal justice, and HIV & hepatitis C. 

Shona’s role at ESS involves developing and delivering our training programmes, as well as facilitating tailored evaluation support sessions. Her work is about helping organisations to plan their evaluation, keeping it simple and relevant to their context and the people they work with.

“My favourite part of my job is talking to organisations about fit-for-purpose evaluation; helping them to be clear about the difference they hope to make, how they know when they’re making it, and how best to capture that with their own situation and people in mind.

Often, many are pleasantly surprised to realise that they’re already doing it – they just don’t have it written down in a clear evaluation plan. That’s where I come in!”

About ESS Online workshops

Form

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  • By entering your organisation's charity number this will makes it easier for us to check that the booking organisation is a third sector organisation based in Scotland.
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