Evaluation of a physical activity promotion program: The example of Agita São Paulo

The evaluation of the Agita São Paulo Program, a multi-leveled and a multi-strategy intervention on promoting physical activity (PA) in a mega-community has shown that: (1) evaluation of the processes and impact has been permanent and essential to the decision-making process; (2) process evaluation included indicators, instruments and evaluation techniques such as questionnaires, meeting and general reports, documents, letters, interviews, database, organization and impact of mega-events, health indexes, investments and costs charts; (3) impact evaluation included individual changes in knowledge, attitudes, recall of the program, and PA levels, as much as the effects on policies, the environment, investment, costs and organization of the target settings of intervention; (4) community-based partners in the evaluation included stakeholders, program coordinators and external agencies.