The Evolution and Elevation of Evaluation in Sport England

Abstract

Sport England has a national role for managing evaluations that are reported directly to the UK government concerning national policy and strategic priorities. To do this Sport England has to make decisions about how to generate and manage the type of data needed to demonstrate impact. Subsequently, partners in receipt of Sport England investment must tailor evaluation approaches according to the steer given them by Sport England. The publication of the Sport England strategy Uniting the Movement, signalled fundamental changes to Sport England’s working and decision-making practices with partners. This chapter provides a practical contribution outlining how evaluation has evolved within Sport England’s purview and how it may need to adapt so that it aligns with the principles and values of Uniting the Movement. This has implications for the management and organisation of evaluation. This chapter also outlines how Sport England has begun to respond to this challenge by developing a new national Evaluation and Learning Approach. This approach represents a broader set of aspirations for evaluation and learning guided by three interrelated, and interdependent ambitions: improve how we evaluate, embed evaluation and learning, and improve how we use what we learn from evaluation.