Editorial
| Author | Melissa Forbes |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/1035719X221121399 |
| Published date | 01 December 2022 |
| Date | 01 December 2022 |
| Subject Matter | Editorial |
Editorial
Evaluation Journal of Australasia
2022, Vol. 22(4) 203–205
© The Author(s) 2022
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
DOI: 10.1177/1035719X221121399
journals.sagepub.com/home/evj
Editorial
Melissa Forbes
Welcome tothis special issue of the Evaluation Journal of Australasia, which charts the
journey of University of Southern Queensland’s use of internal evaluation to become a
continuous learning organisation. As publicly funded entities, universities in Australia
operate within a regulatory framework (University Chancellors Council, 2021), and
must continually monitor the ways in which they use taxpayer funds. This issue
considers how internal evaluation was used to transform practice at the University of
Southern Queensland to ensure that the university not only meets and exceeds its
regulatory obligations but provides an outstanding experience to its students.
I came to internal evaluation with an eclectic disciplinary background, starting my
working life in commercial law, spending some time in the public sector, then retraining
to be a professional musician which led me into higher education teaching and research.
It has been refreshing to step into the evaluator role where disciplinary eclecticism is
valued and useful, rather than being viewed as displaying a lack of focus or “stick-with-
it-ness”. My legal background has helped me navigate the higher education regulatory
context, and to understand how internal evaluation can build the capacity of all staff
working in universities to ensure regulatory obligations are met. My music background
has also been useful for quite different reasons. Musicians and creative artists are
constantly evaluating performance, and we have finely honed skills of observation and
interpretation. My experience with collaborative music practice (Forbes, 2020) has
helped me build relationships with internal stakeholders and build evaluation capacity
(Markiewicz & Patrick, 2016). Having worked as a full-time teaching academic since
2011 at the university, my understanding of the institutional context, including cultural
and organisational history, has benefitted my evaluation practice (Conley-Tyler, 2005;
Rog, 2012), but I have had to carefully ensure that I use this contextual knowledge
impartially. Internal evaluation has provided me with a unifying framework within
which my seemingly disparate skills and knowledge base have coalesced.
Having said all that, this issue is not just aimed at the higher education sector; we
hope it is of interest to internal evaluators more broadly. In the first article, we introduce
Lyn Alderman’s (2014) Continuous Learning Framework for internal evaluation which
provides the map for our journey into internal evaluation in this issue. The framework is
appropriate and useful for universities but can also be used for any organisation seeking
to maintain currency, sustainability, and long-term success. The Continuous Learning
To continue reading
Request your trial