Abstract
One of the problems found in the first decade of education reform in Thailand was practitioners’ misunderstanding due to
confused guidelines on educational management issued by the central authority. The purpose of this research is to develop a
program theory using three approaches. A deductive approach focuses on stated policies and previous research. An inductive
approach builds from observing the intervention in action. A mental model approach focuses on working with stakeholders to
articulate their tacit understandings of how the intervention works. Data were collected through a variety of means:
questionnaires sent to a sample of teachers and administrators, review of documents, and unstructured interviews with
stakeholders. Using the method of structural equation modeling to analyze data related to the education reform policy
implementation program, this study demonstrates how evaluation practitioners can combine three approaches. The study
concludes with a discussion of methodological issues related to developing and testing models of program theory.