An Evaluation of Thurston County's Household Hazardous

Waste Education Program

Bonnie Lange

This paper analyzes the Household Hazardous Waste Education program of Thurston County. It summarizes the accomplishments of the program, examines and analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of the program, and recommends ways to improve the program based on the program assessment.

The evaluation reported here consists of three sections. The first section, the "process evaluation," gives a qualitative assessment of the way the education program works. Subjects such as management structure, goals and objectives, and marketing strategies are analyzed in this section.

The second part of the evaluation, the "performance indicator" evaluation, tracks the program's progress toward program goals. Performance indicators include measures of activity, as well as other progress toward program goals.

The "impact evaluation" is the third stage in the evaluation process. An impact evaluation attempts to measure the actual effects of a program. That is, this step in the evaluation examines whether or not County residents changed their behavior as a result of the Household Hazardous Waste Education Program.

This three-step evaluation resulted in a long list of recommendations, even though it was found that the program has achieved a majority of its goals. These recommendations are divided into three sections: management structure and planning, data collection and analysis, and program strategies.