Evaluations facilitate learning and help us, Interreg programmes, to improve our work. Now is a perfect moment to have a look at impact and operational evaluations for our programmes’ activities in 2014-2020 in order to understand the changes that need to be implemented in the period 2021-2027.

The overarching aim of the event is to find out if (and which) lessons learnt from 2014-2020 evaluations have been taken into account during the 2021-2027 programming process and how they have influenced the programming process and the future programme: Which evaluation elements have contributed or contribute to better understanding and mutual learning in the programming process?
More concrete, the objective of the event is to discuss and understand the following questions:

• What actual changes did our programmes bring?
• Which lessons can Interreg programmes learn from the evaluation in order to implement them in the next period?
• What changes of mindsets, perceptions and attitudes did we achieve?
• How can we effectively take over these changes to the period 2021-2027?
• What has been the role of evaluation in these transformation processes?

During the event we will discuss two different examples of evaluations (a mid-term evaluation and an evaluation on the efficiency and effectiveness) from different perspectives, i.e. the overarching view (the DG REGIO Evaluation Unit, the programme’s and the evaluator’s perspective.

Throughout the event, David Alba (European Commission, DG REGIO, Evaluation and European Semester Unit) will be present and share with us his expertise on these topics.
The target group of the meeting are managers from Interreg Joint Secretariats and Managing Authorities involved in evaluations and the preparation of the 2021-2027 programmes.