Evaluating Thanksgiving

We can’t believe Thanksgiving is just a few days away -- we are so excited to be celebrating the holiday with friends and family! During this holiday, in particular, we spend time reflecting upon and evaluating all that has happened over the past year and appreciating all that we have to be thankful for. We also spend a considerable amount of time planning, organizing, and anticipation that our thanksgiving dinners go as expected – making Thanksgiving truly feel like an evaluators holiday. On that note…we thought it would be fun to share how you can use really basic evaluation principles and concepts to determine the extent to which Thanksgiving dinner was a success (you know we are creating logic models for our dinners as we speak!).

Every year we hope that our thanksgiving meal is a huge success. But how do we know how successful it actually was? We can start with our overarching evaluation question:  To what extent was Thanksgiving dinner a success?

Activities to ensure your dinner is successful can include:  making a list of what you’ll need to buy to prepare your meal to ensure you don’t forget anything; decorating your home for a festive atmosphere; making sure you have enough seating for all your guests; telling guests in advance if you’d like them to bring anything.

Process measures to assess the extent to which the event was successful can include:  Number of guests invited; number of guests who attended; extent to which your meal went as planned (i.e., did you follow your recipe as expected); challenges encountered in making your meal (e.g., turkey was overcooked – yikes!); and lessons learned for next year.

Sample outcome measures can include:  Number of guests who enjoyed the meal; number of guests who asked for your recipe to make one (or all of your dishes) in the future; extent to which guests had fun at your event; and the extent to which your guests felt welcome at your event. 

Did you know…

Before we end our post – we wanted to provide some fun Thanksgiving facts you can share with friends as you wait for the turkey to be ready!

·       Thanksgiving is also celebrated by Canadians  - on the second Monday in October.

·       The first Thanksgiving was observed in Plymouth in 1621.

·       In 1863, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed the last Thursday in November as a national day   of Thanksgiving.

·       In 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt moved Thanksgiving Day one week earlier to boost the Christmas shopping season.

·       In 1942 Congress ruled that the fourth Thursday in November would be observed as Thanksgiving Day and a federal legal holiday.

           Source:  CNN.com

Wishing you a very Happy and Successful Thanksgiving!