Wonders in Nature-Wonders in Neighborhoods ((W.I.N.-W.I.N.) has been providing wild-life related conservation education to schoolchildren throughout the Denver metropolitan area since 1996. Specifically designed for students in early childhood education classes through fifth grade, W.I.N.-W.I.N. is intended to heighten children's awareness and…

Direct observation in natural settings has been recognized for nearly a century as an important methodology to capture the nuances of children's behavior for research, clinical assessment, and program evaluation. These ecologically valid descriptive data complement more widely used behavior rating scales to evaluate the impact of intervention…

The author describes potential evaluation capacity-building activities in contrast to the specifics of an evaluation design. Her response to the case of the Bunche-Da Vinci Learning Partnership Academy is developed in three parts: (1) an initial framing of the Bunche-Da Vinci situation; (2) what should be done before signing a contract; and (3)…

In 2001, the Bunche Academy was chosen by its district to join in partnership with the Da Vinci Learning Corporation to embark on an ambitious whole-school reform initiative, especially designed by the corporation for low-performing schools. In this chapter, the author describes how, as illustrated in the Bunche-Da Vinci Learning Academy context,…

The Exemplary Schools study at Howard University's Center for Research on the Education of Students Placed At Risk (CRESPAR) was designed to aid the program in its goal toward developing and implementing a reform model that "overdetermines" success for all students. The Talent Development (TD) principle of "overdetermination of success" argues…