In this article, we discuss the need for the field of leadership education (LE) to employ detailed outcomes for assessing its learning interventions, along with rigorous metrics in which to measure such outcomes. We define assessment, outcomes, and metrics, and provide numerous examples of how each can be built and improved upon across a variety…

"Pathways to Implementation" highlights innovative strategies and effective models in career pathways policy, implementation, and programming, as well as challenges states encounter in this work. This seven-part series addresses the key elements of Bellwether's framework for career pathways policy implementation. Each brief defines the…

High-quality afterschool and summer learning programs are effective ways to support children and teens and accelerate their academic growth. In fact, the American Rescue Plan prioritized a significant amount of funding for out-of-school time programs because of the evidence of their effectiveness. Over the past few years, state educational…

The International Leadership Association's General Principles for Leadership Programs provides a useful frame for developing, delivering, and assessing leadership programs. In doing so, it is important for leadership scholars, educators, and practitioners to acknowledge and reflect on the complexities of our world, which moves toward strategies to…

I explore how "low-quality evidence" from program performance might still be useful in decision-making. Conceptually, a local government named "Here" is motivated to consider a program from "Elsewhere" that seems to show year-over-year exemplary performance. Here must manage five sources of uncertainty about whether…

Indiana University (IU) is accredited through the Higher Learning Commission (HLC), which requires accredited institutions to regularly review programs within the institution and act upon the outcomes of the review. There is no single campus-based system for program reviews; therefore, the Office of Collaborative Academic Programs (OCAP) developed…

Each year, educators engage in hours of professional learning to enhance their practice. Those hours are limited, both by contract and the imperative of keeping teachers in classrooms as much as possible. It is essential that this professional learning time is well-spent and pays dividends toward the goal of all public education: ensuring that…

The purpose of an academic advisory board is to provide feedback and recommendations to college representatives for an identified academic program or grouping of programs. It is a mechanism through which academic program representatives, typically faculty and program coordinators and/or department chairs, maintain consistent connection with…

Campus administrators and faculty members conceptualized, planned, designed, implemented, and evaluated TANDEM (Thoughtful Advice. Nurtured Diversity. Engaged Mentorship.), a mentorship program designed to attract, support, and retain faculty. This article includes the stages of developing TANDEM and primarily focuses on how the program responded…

Most program evaluation efforts concentrate on assessments of "program implementation" and "program outcomes." However, another area of programs that has not received sufficient attention in the literature is evaluating the plan of the program. Since the quality of the plan and planning process can influence program…

International Leadership Association's "General Principles for Leadership Programs" is a fluid document designed to provide resources to create, redesign, and assess leadership programs. This article provides a broad introduction to the "General Principles for Leadership Programs," including the history and a brief overview of…

Higher education leaders face growing pressure to demonstrate the return on investment (ROI) of not only their institution but also each academic program offering. With increasing accountability and limited time for meaningful reflection on student learning and development, now is the time to rethink how a quasi-annual academic program review…

Athena Swan was established in 2005 with the goal of advancing the careers of women in STEMM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics and Medicine) subjects in higher education. Since then, it has expanded its remit in various ways and has generated some controversy. This paper explains how Athena Swan operates as a policy-scoring scheme,…

In higher education, online students are often precluded from research assistantships that are more accessible for campus-based students. At a highly ranked institution for online learning, we developed the Undergraduate Research Program (URP) to address this gap in opportunities for online students. The URP is designed to engage fully distanced…

As the K-12 student population becomes increasingly diverse, developing cultural competence is essential for educators, including physical education teachers. An online international collaboration is one way to address cultural competence in higher education. The purpose of this article is to discuss steps and suggestions for integrating an online…