Evaluating the Long Term Effects of Teacher Enhancement: Final Report (2001)

Abstract

This is the culminating report of an in-depth, six- year study of science education reform. The reform included teacher enhancement activities as well as curricular materials and was designed to help science students achieve the National Research Council’s Science Standards (NRC, 1995). The longitudinal evaluation project was quite complex, used several data gathering methods and sources, and produced several reports and articles. The evaluation effort had two major components. The first component was designed to compare students who had participated in the reform effort with students from the same site who had not participated in the reform. The second component was to follow a subset of the sites to identify the long-term effects of the reform effort. For all six years of the evaluation effort both qualitative and quantitative data were gathered from principals, teachers and students through extensive site visits and assessment of student outcomes. The purpose of this report is to summarize and condense the findings from the subset sites. It presents the data gathered throughout the course of the evaluation effort by discussing the data from all of the sites as a set and by providing detailed information about each site individually. Furthermore the data are synthesized into a theoretical model for teacher enhancement and curricular implementation, and recommendations for future implementation and evaluation efforts are provided.