If first language maintenance is considered to be a goal of bilingual-bicultural educational programs, then alternative evaluation strategies are called for that will examine the "politics of speaking" in terms of determining the extent to which the informal or "hidden" curriculum and social organization of the program was inadvertently…

A method of evaluation that is appropriate for a student affairs department that contains more than one service unit (e.g., a counseling center or student union) is described. A staff member in each service unit is appointed to conduct that unit's self-study, with the consultative help of an experienced evaluation coordinator. For each unit, the…

This report summary focuses on third-party evaluations of career ladder/incentive pay programs in four states: North Carolina, South Carolina, Arizona, and Utah. The summary addresses programs that contain the concepts included in performance-based ladders, job-enlargement ladders, and professional-development ladders. The first section presents…

This paper details Michael Lewis and Mark Starr's model of early child development known as the salient responses of the human organism. The model is described as a representation of the actions taken by humans in their qualitative attempts to move to more progressive states of development through interactions with the environment. The salient…

Workshops, conferences, clinics, seminars, and training sessions are examples of "temporary systems," in which participants suspend their usual roles and responsibilities and concentrate on a few short-term objectives. One mechanism of a temporary system is the use of feedback to determine the extent to which the project objectives are being…

Since its establishment with a 1986 grant from the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education, the Assessment Resource Center (ARC) at the University of Tennessee has worked with state coordinating boards, other institutions involved in assessment leadership, institutions seeking guidance, and participants in conferences and seminars…

The paper describes the development and psyhometric validation of an instrument to measure co-worker involvement with employees with handicaps in supported employment settings. The Co-worker Involvement Instrument contains 10 items pertaining to physical integration, social integration, vocational integration, training, associating frequency,…

Intended as a resource for individuals wishing to evaluate nutrition education programs, this handbook, one of a series of seven, provides a collection of measuring devices that can improve the quality of such evaluations. Chapter 1 introduces the handbook's contents and outlines evaluation related issues specific to nutrition education programs.…

This monograph provides a framework for analyzing and evaluating the soundness of teacher education reform proposals. Key questions covering five areas that may be addressed to various proposals are presented: (1) problem definition; (2) solutions proposed; (3) rationale for the problem definition and proposed solutions; (4) feasibility of…

In this context, ethics refers to a set of normative standards for resolving dilemmas that policy analysts or evaluators often face with regard to what they should do in performing their roles in the interests of societal desirability. The dilemmas relate to: (1) prediction versus prediction plus prescription; (2) evaluation versus evaluation plus…

Egon G. Guba and Yvonna S. Lincoln were among the first to develop a set of extensive criteria for establishing naturalistic inquiry as a disciplined research methodology. The naturalistic paradigm--also called post-positivist, ethnographic, phenomenological, and qualitative--has gained acceptance as a legitimate alternative to the previously…

This paper focuses on critically analyzing both the potential and the problems of practitioner action research as a means of genuine professional development for classroom teachers today. Action research is a process of systematic inquiry and of knowledge, skill, and attitude growth in which classroom teachers on either an individual or…

In Tennessee, varied data-gathering devices have been employed in an attempt to determine whether an educator is qualified for a given level on the state's career ladder program and, thereby, should attain the meaningful financial benefits linked to that status. In its first year of operation, the Tennessee program employed several domains of…

Five areas are considered with respect to the relationship of merit pay and developmental composition: (1) the kinds of merit pay; (2) the sources of merit pay funds; (3) the combinations of developmental writing programs, types of merit pay, and the sources of funding; (4) the evaluation of teachers for the purposes of merit pay; and (5) the…