Despite the respect of this principle however, the overall evaluation program was harmed as some support staff took advantage of it and left out some vital pieces of information. The most relevant example in this sense was the incident during which a nurse was held at gunpoint and robbed during a house call to an elderly citizen in a low income area of the city. The evaluator was informed of the incident, but was also assured that it was resolved and that it would not generate any outcomes for the support program or the evaluation process. The evaluator took this information on faith and out of respect for the staff, he believed it and went on with his activities. However, as it later on turned out, the incident was much more serious than initially believed and efforts supported by the evaluator to addresses the issue sooner could have been pivotal to a more efficient support program. 5. Welfare

The principle of general and public welfare was a salient motif in the evaluation process. In other words, the evaluator has always been aware that his efforts must also reflect the impact of the support program onto the nurses, but also onto the entire society. The actual emphasis on this feature was however reduced up to the time the support program was in fact completed. By this moment in time, sufficient information had been collected and the evaluator came across some vital pieces of data that would reveal conflicting stands. The robbery incident is also the key element in this discussion as it represents a threat upon the social well-being. Without being able to come in possession of sufficient data regarding the robbery at the time it occurred, the evaluator's emphasis on general and public welfare was reduced -- this implies the failure to respect the welfare principle due to a lack of access to information. But now, it becomes greater with the emergence of the new data. This status quo throws the evaluator in a dilemma as he is unsure of the actual impact the robbery has had.

Additionally, the principle of welfare also forces the evaluator to consider the long-term impacts of both programs, as...

He is doing it at this stage, but previous interest was reduced. Then, there is also the matter of a balance between client needs and the needs of other categories of stakeholders. The evaluator believed he respected the principle, but in light of the new information, it may seem that the balance is uneven. All these add up to his current problem.
6. Your responsibility

At this stage, the final outcome of the support program seems of little use to anybody. Throughout its course of six months, the program has undergone some changes that were not known to the evaluator until the completion of the session. The blame of the evaluator could be looked at from two different angles, both given by the need to respect the guiding principles of good evaluators. On the one hand, there is the need to respect people's privacy and to not pry whenever they do not wish to disclose additional information. From this standpoint, the evaluator is not to be blamed. On the other hand, there is the principle of competence, which argues that the evaluator has to thoroughly research the matter. From this standpoint, the evaluator is definitely to blame for the failure to adapt the evaluation of the changes in the program. The principle of general and public well-being is the one that makes the difference and offers the final answer -- the evaluator has to complete his tasks with a constant consideration of social well-being; sadly enough however, I disregarded this feature and I am to be blamed for the lack of adaptation.

7. What to do?

Given this status quo, it is necessary for the evaluator to take the most objective stand and offer his clients his conclusion. Additionally, in his report, he should mention that the findings could be biased and that he recommenced that the evaluation be conducted again due to lack of adequate information in the process. However, the final report should include an analysis of the support program; it would argue that the findings are not optimistic as the results indicate limited benefits.