The first paper in HREA's Research in Human Rights Education Papers Series reviews twenty-six evaluation reports of human rights training programs, as well as supportive literature. The programs examined are focused on trainings for adults, including target groups such as human rights defenders, police officers, government officials  and the general public.

Based on the recommendations of the referenced program evaluations and the independent analysis of all reports, the author identifies challenges and makes recommendations for improving the quality of human rights training programs at the stages of design, implementation, follow-up and evaluation. The following cross-cutting recommendations stand out as being particularly important for guaranteeing successful and effective trainings:

• Programs need to be more consistently deliver the interactive, experiential, and transformative adult education methodologies that they all agree are essential to human rights training.
• Programs need to emphasize comprehensive mechanisms to follow up with participants after the formal training program is complete.
• Programs should explore how they might carry out reliable and comprehensive research and documentation of their work as the field as a whole lacks solid longitudinal evaluation data of the long-term impact of human rights trainings on participants.

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