A rehabilitation report: measure the result without promising causation
A fictional prison education report follows forty people who completed a vocational course. Thirty-two are recorded as obtaining employment during the stated follow-up period. Eight have no recorded employment outcome, but the report does not explain whether they were unemployed, unavailable for contact or outside the observation window. It gives no comparable nonparticipant group and no baseline information about prior skills, health, family support or local employment conditions. A draft headline says that the programme guarantees employment for every prisoner and is proved to be the only cause of success. Another reader claims that missing follow-up means the programme has no value. The study task is to calculate and interpret the recorded result while recognizing uncertainty and the rehabilitative purpose, without deciding the actual effectiveness of a real Ghanaian programme.
1. Calculate the recorded employment proportion and explain its limits.
Read the worked answer
The recorded proportion is 32/40=80%among these completers. It is not a guarantee for every prisoner, and without a comparable design it does not establish that the course was the sole cause. Missing outcome information must be described rather than automatically counted as a specific reason for failure.
2. Suggest two useful additional pieces of information for evaluation.
Read the worked answer
Clarify the follow-up period and status of the eight people without recorded employment, and compare outcomes with a relevant group while considering prior skills and other baseline differences. This would improve interpretation without making the report a definitive causal experiment by itself.