The Measurement Group

Improving outcomes in health, behavioral health & social services through applied social research

Evaluation Internship/Part-Time position

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Image courtesy of mrpuen at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Image courtesy of mrpuen at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Evaluation Internship or Part-Time Position
Coding of Family Strengthening Themes in Qualitative Case Studies

The Measurement Group LLC has an immediate opening for a part-time temporary Evaluation Assistant/Intern position. The Evaluation Assistant/Intern will primarily assist with coding qualitative case studies from an evaluation of the Westside Partnerships for Families program, a child abuse prevention program that uses a mental health home visiting framework. The Evaluation Assistant/Intern will:

  • Receive training on coding procedures and code of a set of case studies as part of a study to be submitted for publication;
  • Learn how to use qualitative data analysis programs such as NVIVO for coding;
  • Learn about reliability analysis in qualitative inquiry;
  • Assist with preparation of project data for submission to a professional journal;
  • Work under the supervision of senior evaluation staff.

The Evaluation Assistant/Intern may also be assigned additional evaluation support tasks on other projects as needed. This is a short-term position. $15/hour. Work must be performed at the offices of The Measurement Group in Culver City, CA during business hours (9am – 5pm, M-F).

Requirements: Undergraduate or graduate psychology or related social science major, plus experience/knowledge of child welfare, child development, and/or related social services. B.A. preferred, although an undergraduate with relevant experience will be considered.

This project is part of an evaluation of the Westside Partnerships for Family program, which was recently featured in an article in Children and Youth Services Review. The qualitative coding is for a new article that examines in more depth how this mental health home visiting model promotes protective factors for child abuse prevention and family strengthening.

Contact Dr. Lisa Melchior

 

 

 

 

Time flies…or what’s been going on at The Measurement Group

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Image courtesy of dan at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I really didn’t mean for this much time to go by since my last blog entry in May. My colleagues and I at The Measurement Group have been busy with a number of interesting projects. For example:

We recently completed a five-year evaluation of the Los Angeles Integrated Add Us In Consortium, led by the Integrated Recovery Network. This project was funded by the US Department of Labor, Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) to expand employment opportunities for people with disabilities. The Los Angeles Consortium created and implemented a successful model for helping people with primarily mental health disabilities to gain “soft skills,” connect with employers, and gain and maintain jobs that match their abilities and interests. Across the five-year project period, the Los Angeles Consortium helped its clients — many of whom are homeless and dealing with mental illness — in successfully obtaining 193 jobs! It was an incredibly rewarding experience to work with this group and help them document and share their outcomes.

Since earlier this year, we have been working with Arizona First Things First on the evaluation of an online developmental screening program they have implemented in three regions. We’ve interviewed a number of stakeholders to understand issues that they encounter in providing developmental screening to families with young children (0-5 years). In particular, we’ve been learning about the successes and challenges they’ve had in using an online screening tool. We continue to gather and share information with our colleagues on this project to help inform their future developmental screening strategies.

These are just a few highlights of the work we’ve been doing in recent months. In addition, life got busy with high school graduations, family trips, and transitions with my son starting college. So, blogging took a back seat for a while. But with lots of news to share, I will be returning to active blogging soon…if not now, then I’ll make an early new year’s resolution?

The Measurement Group on Twitter

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Twitter logoI tweet for The Measurement Group on Twitter. For those of you who follow me there, I’ve changed my Twitter name from @lmelchior to @DrLisaMelchior.

I tweet about topics related to health, behavioral health, social services outcomes for vulnerable populations and the types of programs The Measurement Group works with. I also tweet about measurement, program evaluation, quantitative/qualitative methods, and data. So whether you are interested in content or methods, find me at @DrLisaMelchior and follow The Measurement Group on Twitter!

Five fun facts about TMG

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Five fun facts about The Measurement Group (aka TMG):

  1.  Our founder, Dr. George Huba (@DrHubaEvaluator), started the company on a folding table in his living room — less than a mile from our current location in Culver City, California.
  2. Our first consulting project was a job analysis of protective services workers for San Diego county. That project continues to inform my work to this day.
  3. In addition to our program evaluation work, we have worked with publishers of psychological assessment tools to help them make user-friendly and psychometrically rigorous materials available to practitioners.
  4. TMG research assistants, who typically come to us as recent college graduates, have gone on to graduate study and successful careers in diverse fields such as public health, psychology, program evaluation, law, medicine, and business.
  5. Since 1988, we’ve worked with more than 400 health and social service programs in 38 states and 39 major metropolitan areas.

For more information, visit us at www.TheMeasurementGroup.com, like us on Facebook, follow me on Twitter, and connect with me on LinkedIn and on Google+.