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program design & management

Evidence-based Strategies - Examples, Research and Tools

 

Strategy f: Provide training and support for teaches to implement persistence strategies, including meeting regularly to share strategies and concerns, discuss student work, and participate in overall program improvement planning.

Examples

New England Learner Persistence Project: Approach to Professional Development and Program Improvement
Andy Nash and Silja Kallenbach
This document describes the multi-stage professional development and program improvement process used by the New England Literacy Resource Center to engage practitioners in inquiry leading to program improvement.

A Team Approach to Program and Staff Development
Interview with Betsy Lowry by Lenore Balliro
In this program, teams made up of ABE and ESOL staff meet every other week to assess needs, research ideas, generate goals, create materials, and propose policies for program improvement.

Research

How Teachers Change: A Study of Professional Development in Adult Education
Cristine Smith, Judy Hofer, Marilyn Gillespie, Marla Solomon, and Karen Rowe
The Professional Development Study examines how practitioners change after participating in one of three professional development models -  multi-session workshops, mentor-teacher groups, or practitioner research groups - and the factors that support and hinder this change.

Tools

Adult Student Persistence Study Circle Guide
National Center for the Study of Adult Learning and Literacy
This study circle guide has detailed instructions for how to implement a study circle on persistence with program staff.  The guide includes numerous readings from research and program experience.

Planning for Program Improvement
System for Adult Basic Education Support (SABES), MA
The purpose of this manual is to guide programs and practitioners in a systematic, data-driven process toward the goal of program improvement.  Its premise is that every literacy program needs to continually evaluate and improve its services, and every adult educator needs to engage in continuous professional development.  The planning process itself is a form of professional development and it informs what the staff’s professional development priorities should be.

Steps to Peer Observation at the Adult Learning Program
Lee Haller
This article describes how this program implements a peer observation protocol with their teachers as part of a program improvement strategy.