Rural Adversity Mental Health Program

Centre for Rural and Remote Mental Health, Orange, New South Wales, University of Newcastle, New South Wales Health 

In association with Dr Chris Cooper, Research Associate developed a monitoring and evaluation framework for the Rural Adversity Mental Health Program (RAMHP). The M&E Framework was underpinned by a review of the evidence within the academic and grey literature about the impact of climate change on rural adversity and community resilience. A program logic / outcomes hierarchy was developed for the purpose of identifying key evaluation questions for a formative and summative evaluation of the three year program.

A range of developmental evaluation methods were proposed to enable the Centre to respond flexibly to evaluating a number of the program elements that supported community development approaches at a local health district level in response to local community needs. The framework also suggested a number of traditional evaluation methods as well as identifying monitoring data and on-line tools for use at the local Area Health Districts across regional NSW.