What is the purpose of Steven's Program Evaluation?

Read the following case study, review the data sets, and answer the subsequent questions.

Case Study

Steven is a Licensed Professional Counselor who works for a community mental health center providing a psychoeducation group on stress management and anxiety reduction. The goals of the program are for members to increase coping strategies for daily life stressors and reduce their current level of anxiety. Steven holds weekly psychotherapy group meetings on Wednesdays at noon in a conference room at the mental health center. The therapy group is a closed group that runs continuously in 8-week intervals. Clients are referred to the group by therapists, physicians, and clergy. Inclusion criteria to participate in the group include formal referral and a Beck Anxiety Inventory Score of 22 or higher.

In an effort to determine whether the services are meeting the needs of the clients, Steven has conducted a Program Evaluation and collected pre- and post-test program data from three sets of group participants. His findings will be used to determine renewal of his program. Analyze the following quantitative and qualitative data and determine whether enough evidence exists to rule the program as effective and make one recommendation regarding the future of the program.

Pre-Test Data

Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) Pre-Intervention Scores

Group 1	Group 2	Group 3
1	25	22	31
2	24	24	30
3	22	24	30
4	22	27	29
5	27	22	28
6	28	33	24
7	25	36	24
8	25	33	22
9	29	32	27
10	24	27	28

Post-Test Data

Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) Post Intervention Scores

Group 1	Group 2	Group 3
1	25	21	30
2	16	20	20
3	21	22	19
4	20	18	24
5	21	20	22
6	19	23	21
7	22	34	21
8	24	33	20
9	28	30	20
10	24	22	18

Post-Intervention Qualitative Survey Responses

Question: Do you feel that participating in this group helped you feel better prepared to cope with daily life stressors?

Group 1	Group 2	Group 3
1	Y	Y	Y
2	N	N	Y
3	Y	Y	Y
4	Y	Y	Y
5	Y	Y	Y
6	N	Y	N
7	N	Y	Y
8	Y	Y	N
9	Y	N	N
10	Y	Y	Y