Dr Rick Stapenhurst talking to delegates at the seminar.
knowledge about the importance and need for creating effective parliamen- tary committees for a well-functioning parliamentary system.Attending Parliamentarians and parliamentary staff appreciated the opportunity to exchange experiences and compare challenges across their countries. Particularly active were the discussions over current trends in accountability standards across the nations. In addi- tion, participants learned, some for the first time, how to operate a course in a self-paced format. Participants communicated that the
module was easy to follow,and would be easy to implement without the video conferencing component in a completely self-paced format. The delivery of the first pilot, how-
ever, did expose some of the negative realities of holding participants respon- sible for completing their coursework independently since not all participants took their homework seriously. This work included completing a
few units that they had to review on their own prior to the meetings and be prepared to engage in discussions on those units. It was also evident that many participants did not adequately utilize the website that was set up for the course.They were encouraged to visit the site and take part in on-line discussions but only about half did. Future offerings include an adap- tation of the Committees module for delivery by WBI and the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs for parliamentary staff in
Guatemala and the Dominican Republic and the delivery of the Budget module by WBI and the Centre for Democratic Institutions at Australian National University to parliamentary staff in Oceana. Learning from experience, these
course offerings will need to consider methods of incentivizing participants to fully participate in all course com- ponents. For those participants who use limited internet as a reason for not fully participating in the course, the learning programme might consider requiring participants to prove that they have arranged for access at their Parliaments internet work stations as a prerequisite for course participation. Beyond encouraging greater par-
ticipation, this method may have the added benefit of exposing their administrative offices to the impor- tance of increased internet access for the modern functioning of parlia- mentary service. Perhaps the pro- gramme should only award activity certificates to those participants who actively participate in either the videoconference or the online discus- sion forums.Without such proof of participation,we run the risk of awarding participants for nonpartici- pation, the old “bums on benches” problem that instructors face throughout the education arena.
Proposed mechanisms for long term programme assessment WBI’s Evaluation Group (IEG) designs and conducts rigorous empir-
ical evaluations of the learning and capacity development programmes implemented at WBI. These evaluations use both quali-
tative and quantitative methodologies and can include participants’ assess- ments of the quality of learning activities and their relevance, effec- tiveness, and potential impact (level 1 evaluations), attitudes, knowledge, or skills that participants acquire during these activities (level 2 evaluations), and in subsequent changes in partici- pants' behaviour and performance (level 3 evaluations). In addition to the informal evaluations conducted at the end of the course, the pilot learn- ing programme ended with a level one evaluation by all participants. It is useful to hear participant
responses to the level one survey ques- tions, and the results for this learning programme through these evaluations are quite positive.However, it would be beneficial to also conduct level two and level three evaluations to measure the course’s impact on participant job responsibilities and professional behav- iour, thus meeting the learning pro- gramme’s long-term goals and pur- pose. One question that remains moot: could this course form the basis of an accredited parliamentary staff training programme? Such a move could cer- tainly provide the incentive to parlia- mentary staff to undertake the training and could also help ensure that course content is maintained, updated and revised as necessary to meet participants’ needs.