Evaluation Design: measuring STEM Learning and Professional Development

Effective evaluation design can be difficult for complex projects. The Molecular Biology Initiative (MBI) Program partners biology graduate students with teachers at high schools in rural southeast Georgia. The fellow-teacher teams work together throughout the year to generate hands-on classroom activities in biology, chemistry, and physical science for approximately 2000 students. Given the numbers, locations and types of stakeholders, the MBI Program required a comprehensive data collection system to provide timely information for data-based decision making; this presentation will outline key features of the communication/evaluation structure. Evaluation targeted distinct outcomes for each group of stakeholders, but ease and speed of delivery were key for all tools. Taken together, the mixed-method tools demonstrated positive learning gains and/or professional development for graduate student fellows, partner teachers and the high school students and highlighted areas for additional development. The overall design has key features that may be applicable to other studies