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Evaluation of CIHR's HIV/AIDS Community-Based Research Program - Final Report
1.0 Introduction
The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) hired PRA Inc. to evaluate the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV)/Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS) Community-Based Research (CBR) Program and its funding tools. The purpose of the evaluation is to assess the rationale for the program, the effectiveness of its design and delivery processes, and its successes. CIHR will use the results of the evaluation to strengthen the HIV/AIDS CBR Program and maximize its impact on Canada's response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This report provides the evaluation findings.
1.1 Methodology
The Evaluation of CIHR's HIV/AIDS CBR Program draws on five lines of evidence including a document review, review of funded and non-funded applicant files, key informant interviews, case studies of funded projects, and a stakeholder consultation.
Document review. The purpose of the document review was to gather background information on the CIHR HIV/AIDS CBR Program, provide an overview of the program, and define a set of issues and questions to guide the evaluation. Documents reviewed include: The Federal Initiative to Address HIV/AIDS in Canada: Strengthening Federal Action in the Canadian Response to HIV/AIDS; the Strategic Plan for the CIHR HIV/AIDS Research Initiative; background documents on the Federal Initiative performance measurement and evaluation strategy; the most recent Requests for Applications for each of the six CIHR HIV/AIDS CBR Program tools; and a summary of application pressure, success rates, and funded projects for the different tools and streams by competition. The results of the document review are provided in Section 2 of this report and the evaluation matrix appears in Appendix A.
File review. The purpose of the file review was to learn of challenges applicants experience in applying to the program and gather information on project-level outcomes. CIHR, based on criteria provided by PRA, randomly selected 30 projects for review. Selected files included a mix of funded and non-funded projects, projects from the general stream and the Aboriginal stream, and projects from each of the six funding tools. Most of the funded projects included in the review were completed and had submitted a final report. Table 1 shows the distribution of files reviewed.
| Table 1: Distribution of files reviewed | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Funding tool | Funded projects | Non-funded projects | ||
| General stream | Aboriginal stream | General stream | Aboriginal stream | |
| Catalyst grant | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 |
| Operating grant | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 |
| Capacity-building workshop | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Masters Award | 1 | 1 | 1 | - |
| Doctoral Award | 1 | 1 | - | 1 |
| Community-Based Research Facilitator | 3 | 2 | - | 1 |
| Total | 12 | 8 | 5 | 5 |
Key informant interviews. The purpose of the key informant interviews was to collect information about the program's relevance, community needs for CBR, the level of community engagement in projects, the expected outcomes of projects, and knowledge transfer activities associated with funded projects. The interviews also helped identify actual and potential program promotion mechanisms as well as issues associated with the processes for applying to the program, reviewing applications, and releasing funding.
CIHR identified potential key informants for the interviews and emailed them a letter to request their participation. PRA then contacted the key informants to schedule an interview time and, to help them prepare for the discussion, provided them with background information about the program and a copy of the interview questions. The interviews were conducted over the phone, in the respondent's preferred official language. Each interview took between 60 and 90 minutes to complete. To ensure accuracy, the interviews were audio-recorded for the researcher's internal use; the recordings will be destroyed at the conclusion of the evaluation.
A total of 36 key informants participated in an interview, including:
- CIHR staff (n=4)
- CIHR Partners (n=2)
- Steering Committee members (n=2)
- Merit Review Committee members (n=4)
- Community-Based Research Facilitators (n=5)
- Funded applicants (n=12)
- Non-funded applicants (n=4)
- Stakeholders who have not applied for funding (n=3)
Separate interview guides were used for the various respondent groups. A copy of the guides appears in Appendix C.
Case studies. The purpose of the case studies was to take an in-depth look at projects funded through this program. They gathered information about the process of applying to program, developing partnerships, conducting the research, disseminating the results, and using the findings to address community issues. Two case studies were conducted, including one from the general stream and one from the Aboriginal stream. The case studies were selected in consultation with CIHR. They included a file review and a series of key informant interviews with stakeholders in the project. A short write-up for each case study appears in Appendix D.
Stakeholder consultation. Following the completion of the data collection activities, a stakeholder consultation was held in Toronto to review the evaluation findings, discuss recommendations, and identify next steps for the program. The consultation took place on December 9 and 10, 2008 and was attended by 39 participants.
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