Search results

In this chapter, the author builds from foundational scholarship which suggests that service-learning yields positive outcomes for students, faculty, and community partners. The author first suggests that service-learning can be a vehicle for humanizing community partners as well as students, faculty, and course content, then describes a program evaluation context wherein community partners would benefit from a humanizing service-learning experience. The author then introduces the field of program evaluation and the foundational documents espoused by the American Evaluation Association, and looks at the organizational structure of the Department of Organizational Leadership, Policy, and Development at the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities, which houses the Evaluation Studies specialization. Next, the author presents a foundational program evaluation course, discussing its emphasis on service-learning and on humanizing the students, community partners, and course content, and introducing the textbooks, readings, and activities used to bring the experience to life. The author concludes by looking at opportunities and challenges to integrating program evaluation into a departmental core at other universities.

We consider the challenges to education in South Sudan by utilizing a national random sample of South Sudanese (provided by the BBC Media Action) and then semi-structured interviews with eight education service providers (SPs). We find that the conflicts have large impacts on educational opportunities. States that experience greater conflict also experience greater poverty. Under such conditions, children are important for providing resources for the family and education can become secondary. In these conflict areas, respondents are more likely to agree that education is more important for boys than for girls. SPs detail the large number of obstacles to delivering education. Displacement and fleeing danger creates problems with hunger, illness, and safety. SPs discuss the variability of resources, the scarcity of schools and teachers, and the uncertainty of life in South Sudan. They also discuss triumphs they have experienced and suggest changes or interventions that could increase educational opportunities.

Although educators would likely agree that values and ethics are important in all disciplines, they have particular importance for practice-oriented fields. These applied professionals need to solve complex social problems that require the application of ethical standards and value perspectives. While the importance of value-engaged practice is known to the applied field, there is little research and conversation about how values can be integrated into teaching. This chapter synthesizes values-education approaches in various practice-based disciplines such as public administration (PA), program evaluation, social work, and public health. This chapter draws from empirical and theoretical works as well as the authors' experiences developing, participating in, and conducting values-based research on professionals and professional education.

Educators strive to develop and implement high impact educational experiences, which are critical to ensuring university courses and curricula serve as memorable and transferable learning experiences for students. It is not clear, however, which experiences are exceptional from a student perspective, or what kinds of illustrative examples exist in applied disciplines. In this chapter, we ground our discussion of high impact educational experiences in the field of program evaluation, contextualize it as organized at the University of Minnesota, describe three experiences that have been repeatedly described as impactful by students, and engage in a collective dialogue as teachers and learners.

This paper aims to discuss methods for measuring and comparing the performance of Portuguese schools, confronting metric and practice benchmarking exercises.

Data on the schools was collected within the context of a programme for school evaluation launched by the Ministry of Education in 2007. The paper first uses a non‐parametric technique, data envelopment analysis, to assess the sample of schools using the data collected, taking a value‐added approach. The results obtained are compared with the results obtained by the panels of evaluators within the national evaluation programme of schools.

The paper concludes that the performance of the schools under the metric benchmarking exercise does vary substantially. However, the results do not correlate with the judgements made by the panels of assessors regarding schools' results. This might be because assessors find it difficult to take a value‐added approach and instead assess schools mostly on output measures, such as exam classifications and graduation rates, having difficulty in taking into account pupils' socio‐economic background and other variables not under the control of the school.

The paper focuses on the Portuguese context, and its findings might not be directly applicable to other contexts. Also, if other quantitative and qualitative methods were used, other results might have been obtained.

Although the study is focused on the Portuguese context, contributing towards a better understanding of Portuguese secondary school performance, it is believed it will be helpful to inform the debate on school evaluation, performance improvement and policy setting in other contexts.

The paper concludes by arguing for metric benchmarking exercises of the type proposed, to inform schools, evaluators and policy decision‐makers, in combination with practice benchmarking exercises, which are better suited for qualitative aspects of performance.

The purpose of this paper is to measure and compare the performance of Portuguese secondary schools.

Some data on the schools were collected via an electronic questionnaire sent to 103 secondary schools of the centre region of Portugal; other needed data were available through the Centre Regional Education Authority. Of the 33 schools that participated in the study, there was complete data for 29. A non‐parametric technique, data envelopment analysis (DEA), was used to assess the sample of schools and the results obtained were compared with some preliminary results of a national evaluation programme of schools.

From the findings, the tentative conclusion is that most schools are following national education policy priorities relating to decreasing dropout rates and increasing completion rates. School performance does not seem to relate to geographic location, size of the school, typology of the school or rotation of its executive committee. The paper concludes by discussing the need for metric benchmarking exercises of the type proposed, to inform schools, evaluators and policy decision makers. Finally, the complementarities between metric and practice benchmarking exercises are argued for.

The paper reports on an exploratory study, and thus it contains limitations which need to be overcome by further work. The sample used is small and self‐selected; the DEA models used are quite simple; also, it would be desirable to compare the results of the DEA, with parametric techniques that have been used to evaluate school performance.

The paper makes a contribution to the understanding of schools' performance management, in order to inform schools, evaluators and policy decision makers.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the changing role of higher education as it adapts to the information age. The article posits that a personalized, competency-based model will be the most successful.

The paper is based on research and observations of post-secondary education. It relies on existing literature and comparisons across disciplines to demonstrate the need for change and the ability for universities to adapt to the current needs.

Universities will focus less on information dissemination and more on increasing the quality of available information; improving programs and processes for learners; and ensuring that all learners receive, analyze and apply knowledge that will allow them to be successful in their fields. The paper describes the evidence for these needs and potential pathways for competence.

Learners in the information age look to universities for different roles than in the past. Universities must be able to respond to learners’ preferences and needs, connecting with industries to determine best practices and training skills.

This is an original work. This paper draws on existing literature and the expertise of education leaders involved in many national and regional associations on the future of education.

This study seeks to develop and describe the benchmarking approach of enhancement‐led evaluation in higher education and to present a cross‐evaluation process for degree programmes.

The benchmarking approach produces useful information for the development of degree programmes based on self‐evaluation, evaluation visits and analyses.

The cross‐evaluation of degree programmes can result in recommendations not only for the improvement of the degree programme, but also for that of the whole institution and the evaluation process.

The results of the study are useful for those who want to improve the quality culture of higher education institutions.