Assignment #1

Assignment #1 – Carmel Hill Fund Education Program http://www.carmelhill.org/images/Carmel%20Hill%20Final.pdf

The Carmel Hill Fund Education Program introduced Renaissance Learning’s Accelerated Reader reading management software into disadvantaged schools across Harlem, Denver, and Louisiana in hopes of increasing reading levels. The Accelerated Reader program allows users to complete quizzes on books and other materials and immediately view their results after completion. Teachers are also able to create individual student goals based on reading and comprehension level though the Accelerated Reader program.

What model was used?
The evaluation of the Carmel Hill Fund Education Program utilized a summative model. The evaluators took a large sample size, 10,617 students from 43 schools across Denver, Louisiana, and Harlem, and tracked their reading achievement at the end of the 2005-2006 school year. The goal of the Accelerated Reader program was to increase reading achievement. According to the evaluator’s findings, the program was effective in doing so. The evaluators used multiple measures to reach their findings. In Colorado the Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) was used to determine where students were scoring as compared to state standards. In Louisiana, LEAP(Louisiana Educational Assessment Program) tests were used to compare to state standards.

What are the strengths of this evaluation?
A major strength of this evaluation was the effective demonstration of how successful the Accelerated Reader program was. Statistically, it was shown that there was an improvement of 4 percentiles overall of reading achievement. Through the use of the STAR Reading program, which tracks reading achievement, the evaluators were able to determine gain in achievement at every grade level. Another strength of this evaluation was the use of multiple measures to determine results. Not only were scores within the Accelerated Reading program analyzed, scores from the STAR Reading program as well as the CSAP and the LEAP tests were also analyzed and compared to state standards.

In using a summative approach to evaluating the Carmel Hill Fund Education Program, the evaluators efficiently demonstrated the effectiveness of this program. Using a quantitative approach, the reading achievement of over 10,000 students was successfully assessed.

What are the weaknesses of this evaluation?
A weakness of this evaluation was seen in the findings that very high and high comprehension level readers achieved more than those who read more poorly. No suggestions were made as to why the poor readers were not improving as much or what could be done to help these readers. Perhaps in the future, students could be separated into levels based on reading ability and comprehension. Through this, it may be possible to adjust the Accelerated reader program to assist lower reading levels better. Another weakness of this evaluation was that not all teachers had to or did become certified in using the Accelerated Reader program. Evaluators stated that students who learn from teachers who have been certified in the Accelerated Reader program perform better than those students in classes with uncertified teachers. In having mandatory certification it is possible that more achievement would be seen in student overall.