Historically, colleges have used standardized testing to determine whether a student is ready for college-level work or requires developmental courses first, but this method has been criticized as inaccurate. To obtain more accurate placements, nearly three-quarters of colleges now use multiple measures assessment (MMA) systems. These systems…

This report presents an approach to evaluating networked improvement communities (NICs) and describes the tools used to apply the approach to a formative evaluation of the Minnesota Alternative Learning Center Networked Improvement Community (Minnesota ALC NIC). In fall 2019 leaders at the Minnesota Department of Education requested support from…

How should colleges determine whether students are placed into developmental or college-level courses? Each year, colleges place millions of students into developmental math and English courses upon enrollment. To do so, colleges most often use a high-stakes placement test, which numerous research studies have shown to be highly inaccurate in…

State-issued seals and certificates of biliteracy are increasingly common nationwide. Nevertheless, limited research to date has examined how this state legislation functions as language in education policy and the ideological foundations of these policies. Addressing this gap, the present paper examines state seals as an instance of neoliberal…

A growing number of states are interested in tracking the readiness of children entering kindergarten. In 2010, just seven states (Alaska, Connecticut, Florida, Hawaii, Maryland, Minnesota, and Vermont) collected Kindergarten Entry Assessment (KEA) data for the purposes of aggregating data at the state level. Since this time, most states report…

The development of student thinking skills is a major goal of business education. As with other such goals, student outcomes assessment must be undertaken to measure goal achievement. Thinking is difficult to teach; it is also difficult to assess. The purpose of this article is to improve management educators' understanding of student thinking…

The responsibility for college success has historically rested with the student, but since the 1980s, educators have taken increasing ownership of this, designing structures that increase the likelihood of learning, success, and retention. These efforts have included a variety of initiatives--first year seminars, learning communities,…

We want our students to experience system testing of both desktop and web applications, but the cost of professional system-testing tools is far too high. We evaluate several free tools and find that AutoIt makes an ideal educational system-testing tool. We show several examples of desktop and web testing with AutoIt, starting with simple…

Each year, the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) publishes the "State Teacher Policy Yearbook," a comprehensive examination of the state laws, rules and regulations that govern the teaching profession, measured against a realistic set of reform goals. For five years running, the full "Yearbook" compendium…

The recent release of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2-Restructured Form (MMPI-2-RF) has received much attention from the clinical psychology community. Particular concerns have focused on Restructured Clinical Scale 3 (RC3; Cynicism). This article briefly reviews the major criticisms and responses regarding the restructuring of…

Systematic program evaluations of adolescent catechesis curricula are seldom completed and rarely published. This makes it very challenging to understand what is working and what is not. This case study describes the findings of a program evaluation of the Youth in Theology and Ministry curriculum of Saint John's School of Theology and Seminary in…

Systematic evaluation is an essential tool for understanding program effectiveness. This article describes the pilot test of a statewide evaluation tool for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program-Education (SNAP-Ed). A computer algorithm helped Community Nutrition Educators (CNEs) build surveys specific to their varied educational settings…

A team at the University of Minnesota conducted the Collaboratives for Excellence in Teacher Preparation (CETP) core evaluation between 1999 and 2004. The purpose of the CETP core evaluation was to achieve consensus among CETP project leaders and project evaluators on evaluation questions; to develop, pilot, and field test evaluation instruments…

The purpose of this paper is to inform evaluators of a method of evaluating capacity building in educational programs. One definition of capacity building is helping an organization increase its ability to fulfill its mission (Wing, 2004). Evaluators of capacity-building efforts therefore must focus on evidence that the program has helped to build…

The University of Minnesota Extension conducted a social network analysis (SNA) to examine its outreach to organizations external to the University of Minnesota. The study found that its outreach network was both broad in its reach and strong in its connections. The study found that SNA offers a unique method for describing and measuring Extension…