Accountability is now a requirement in education, and that extends to professional development. Leaders must understand what evaluation is, what its purposes are, and the critical levels of professional development evaluation to be able to provide meaningful data that demonstrate the difference professional learning makes.

Over the past two decades the interest and use of student portfolios for assessing student learning outcomes has grown considerably. This paper presents an overview of the portfolio approach to outcome assessment adopted by the Department of Management at California State University, San Bernardino and discusses major issues encountered over six…

Many adults in OECD countries have low language, literacy and numeracy (LLN) skills. The consequences of these low foundation skills span the economic, health and social well-being of individuals, families and communities. Investment in this sector of adult education is therefore crucial. This study looks specifically inside the programmes for…

Strategic planning is complex (Dodd, 2004), and when managed well, it requires deliberate incorporation of evidenced-based data and the collaboration of key stakeholders. Thus, it is essential that the planning process includes the integration of data that are collected regularly and that both internal and external professional partners have the…

This study focused on the relationship between school performance and performance on a dichotic listening (DL) task in dyslexic children. Dyslexia is associated with impaired phonological processing, related to functions in the left temporal lobe. DL is a frequently used task to assess functions of the left temporal lobe. Due to the predominance…

Proving that technology works is not as simple as proving that a new vendor for art supplies is more cost effective. Technology effectiveness requires both the right software and the right implementation. Just having the software is not enough. Proper planning, training, leadership, support, pedagogy, and software use--along with many other…

Building on the promise of interactive, multimedia education, this evaluation study examines an alcohol abuse prevention program, AlcoholEdu, delivered through an interactive Web-based format for the purpose of reducing the harm associated with student alcohol abuse. The study uses a clustered, randomly assigned post-test only evaluation design…

This study examined five of 12 physical education teachers participating in the Assessment Initiative for Middle School Physical Education (AIMS-PE), a reform-based teacher development project designed to help teachers examine and reframe their assessment practices and to design and implement curricular programs that encourage active teaching and…

The relationship between substantive arts involvement and social, cognitive, and artistic development is positive. Little is known about arts integrated within special education services to improve academic, cognitive, and social skills. We examined arts-based work and its impact on education of students with disabilities. During Study I, we…

The Indiana Department of Education, at the direction of Phyllis Lewis, commissioned the National Association of Peer Programs (NAPP: formerly known as the National Peer Helpers Association) and the authors listed above to develop a rubric for peer helping programs. Development of the rubric began with a review of the NAPP Programmatic Standards…

Evaluations of practice have often adopted experimental or quasi-experimental approaches and have focused heavily on outcomes of innovative programmes. This creates problems in replicating studies and effectively creates obstacles to the sharing of good practice. In this paper, ideas from Pawson and Tilley's (1997) approach to Realistic Evaluation…

The 4Rs Program (Reading, Writing, Respect and Resolution) is a "dual focus" whole school universal intervention designed to promote literacy development and social-emotional learning, that is currently being rigorously evaluated using a school-randomized trial of 18 elementary schools (9 intervention, 9 control) in New York City. The…

In recent years, a growing political emphasis has been placed upon the development of transformative assessment-driven reform in schools. There is global consensus on the value of assessment activities that are carefully designed to be consistent with desired learning outcomes, and which coherently connect learning theory, the curriculum,…

The Bologna Declaration brought reforms into higher education that imply changes in teaching methods, didactic materials and textbooks, infrastructures and laboratories, etc. Statistics and mathematics are disciplines that traditionally have the worst success rates, particularly in non-mathematics core curricula courses. This research project,…

Ubiquitous computing and mobile technologies provide a new perspective for designing innovative outdoor learning experiences. The purpose of this study is to propose a formative assessment design for integrating PDAs into ecology observations. Three learning activities were conducted in this study. An action research approach was applied to…