From the foreword: “Every other winter the legislatures of about forty states meet in deliberative session. They consider approximately 1,000 bills on educational questions and enact about 200 of them into law. This pamphlet has been compiled with the object of making available to legislators, school workers, and others having at heart the interests of public education, salient facts concerning school conditions in all the states. The figures have been derived from official sources and every care exercised to insure their accuracy. Every endeavor has been made to avoid complexities and technicalities. The object of the work is to render available to each state the experience of all.

A selection from the papers written by Mary E. Richmond, edited with biographical notes by Joanna C. Colcord, director of the Charity Organization Department, Russell Sage Foundation, and Ruth Z.S. Mann.

MARY E. RICHMOND was director of the Charity Organization Department at the Russell Sage Foundation.

A report on the adoption of the Transportation Agreement, with contributions from Alexander M. Wilson, assistant director of the Department of Public Health and Charities of Philadelphia; Mabel Tibbot, overseer of the poor, Fort Dodge, Iowa; George S. Wilson, secretary of the Board of Charities, District of Columbia; and the State Board of Charities of Missouri, in a “Letter of Advice to County Courts.”

A look at athletic exercises promoted by the Girls’ Branch of the Public Schools Athletic League, including folk dancing, relays, and athletic competitions. From the Playground Association Committee of America.

Proving that any program designed to change our social behavior is doing what it set out to do is one of the most difficult problems faced by social science. Yet those responsible for such a program must attempt an evaluation of its results if they are to achieve the support they need. Edward A. Suchman, one of the world's foremost experts in measuring social behavior, presents the most comprehensive study of evaluation available to date.

In Evaluative Research he describes the techniques used to determine empirically the extent to which social goals are actually being achieved, to locate the barriers to the achievement of these goals, and to discover the unanticipated consequences of social actions.

The book is divided into three main sections, representing the conceptual, the methodological, and the administrative aspects of evaluation. It begins with a brief historical account and a general critique of the current status of evaluation studies. The introduction is followed by a conceptual analysis of the evaluative process, including a discussion of different levels of objectives. The methodological section includes an analysis of various research designs applicable to evaluative research. The place of evaluation in the administrative process is related to program planning, demonstration, and operation. Administrative resistance and barriers to evaluation are examined along with the problems in the utilization of the findings.

The book concludes with a brief exposition on the relationship of evaluative research to social experimentation stressing the potential contribution which public service and social action programs can make to our knowledge of administrative science and social change.

This book will have many uses. It will aid the evaluative research person in striking a balance between rigorous method and the situation in which he must function. For the operating practitioner, the book will explain what competent evaluation involves. Administrators will find the volume and invaluable aid.

This book examines the work of early-twentieth century charity organizations, in particular those in urban environments.

Mary E. Richmond was the author of “Friendly Visiting Among the Poor,” general secretary of the Philadelphia Society for Organizing Charity

The organization and methods of relief used after the earthquake and fire of April 18, 1906, compiled from studies by Charles J. O’Connor, Francis H. McLean, Helen Swett Artieda, James Marvin Motley, Jessica Peixotto, and Mary Roberts Coolidge, offering a book of ready reference for use on occasions of special emergency.

A survey by the Department of Surveys and Exhibits, Russell Sage Foundation, the result of field investigations on vital statistics carried out between March and May, 1914, supplemented by co-operative efforts by city and state officials and local volunteer workers.

FRANZ SCHNEIDER, JR. was sanitarian at the Department of Surveys and Exhibits of the Russell Sage Foundation.

Proceedings of a conference on the prospective work of Carson College for Girls and Charles E. Ellis College, called by the Department of Child-Helping of the Russell Sage Foundation, held at Philadelphia, October 13–14, 1915, on invitation of the Trustees of Carson College and Ellis College.

Foreword by Hastings H. Hart, president of the conference.