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Session Title: Integrating High Quality Evaluation Into a National Integrated Services in Schools Initiative
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Panel Session 266 to be held in BONHAM D on Thursday, Nov 11, 10:55 AM to 12:25 PM
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Sponsored by the Pre-K - 12 Educational Evaluation TIG
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| Chair(s): |
| Keith McNeil, University of Texas, El Paso, kamcneil2@utep.edu
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| Abstract:
Elev8 is a national initiative funded by Atlantic Philanthropies that provides wrap-around services in selected middle schools to students and their families. The one national quantitative evaluator and four local qualitative evaluators will participate in the panel and will address three topics that surfaced. The first topic is the need for relationship building. Relationships need to be built not only with school staff, but also with a large number of project staff from a large number of organizations that are providing services to students and their families. The second topic is the press between maximizing integration and maximizing effects of the program. The third topic is the press for outcomes to support and sustain the program. The evaluation was designed without any kind of comparison group, so the effectiveness of the program has to rely on the quantitative collection of participation rates and the qualitative collection of data.
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Overview of the Elev8 Model and Evaluation Plan
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| Jacqueline Williams Kaye, Atlantic Philanthropies, j.williamskaye@atlanticphilanthropies.org
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A brief overview of the Elev8 model will be accompanied by a brief discussion of the two major aspects of the model that at are seldom in other wrap-around models. These two aspects are Integration and Sustainability, With respect to Integration, the interest of Atlantic Philanthropies was to have the various providers work together so that their efforts with the students and families would result in more than the efforts of each individual provider. (The sum of the whole is more than the sum of the parts.) Sustainability is the purposeful effort to plan for continued services after AP funding was over at the end of four years. Funding was earmarked for this effort. Finally, the evaluation plan will be overviewed.
Jacqueline Williams Kaye is at Atlantic Philanthropies and part of her responsibility is to oversee the evaluation of the multisite implementation of Elev8 in four sites across the U.S.
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Crucial Role of Relationship Building in a Multilayered Evaluation
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| Maria Luisa Gonzalez, University of Texas, El Paso, mlgonzalez6@utep.edu
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The Elev8 wrap-around services for middle school students and families include a health center on campus, extended learning programming, and support services for families. At many school sites there are several agencies providing extended learning programming, family supports, and health services. For instance, the health center may have a dentist funded by one agency, a family nurse practitioner funded by another, and a health educator funded by another. The need for the evaluators develop close relationships with each of these providers, as well as the school staff, is crucial. Examples will be provided of both success and challenges of such relationship building.
Maria Luisa Gonzalez was on faculty at New Mexico State University for 19 years and directed numerous training grants that prepared both Hispanic and Native American students for leadership roles. She has conducted numerous local program evaluations and has worked on the qualitative evaluation of Elev8-NM since 2007.
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Relationship Between Maximizing Integration and Maximizing Effects of the Program
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| Lauren Rich, Chapin Hall, lrich@chapinhall.org
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Elev8 funding required the various providers to integrate at the school site and with the school site. Some Providers feel that the Integration effort reduces the potential effectiveness of their programming, sometimes resulting in providers creating silos and not working together.
Lauren Rich is a senior researcher at Chapin Hall. Her primary interest is in conducting research that will contribute to improving the life chances of children living in poverty, particularly through the realm of education. She conducts longitudinal study of patterns of service utilization among low-income families, and the relationship of service use to family functioning, child development, and school readiness.
She recently completed a five-year project examining outcomes among disadvantaged children and youth attending residential schools. She has also conducted and published research on youth employment, teen childbearing, welfare reform, child support enforcement, the educational attainment of teen mothers, and the economic status of low-income, noncustodial fathers.
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Making the Case for Qualitative, Formative Evaluation in a Quantitative, Outcomes-driven Environment
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| Stephen La France, LFA Group, steven@lfagroup.com
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Today’s environment often demands proof of effectiveness, yet local Elev8 evaluators are charged with conducting a qualitative, formative evaluation. Local Elev8 evaluation teams have worked hard to demonstrate the usefulness of the approach and to make the case that qualitative data are capturing the “true story.” Elev8 Oakland’s evaluation Project Director will present on these issues given his training in qualitative methods. Lessons from the first year informed strategies for the second year, including restructuring the field team and designing an intricate process for communicating findings to the lead agency in real time. These changes, among others, have increased the relevance and value of the evaluation for program implementers in their goal of sharing promising practices across schools and addressing challenges as they arise. Evaluation quality also has increased with ongoing hypothesis-testing through multiple perspectives, and in making a careful distinction between internal and external validity.
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