1. LINKS Evaluation

2. Why evaluate? Evaluation of the LINKS Advising Program is particularly important in this pilot year. It gives participating staff, students and parents to provide valuable information through surveys and feedback forms. This will allow the West Virginia Department of Education an opportunity to further refine and prepare the program for full implementation in 2009 – 2010.

3. How are we evaluating? All student and staff surveys will be accessible online. Where Internet access is not uniformly available, printed versions will be provided. Printed versions of the short Student Feedback Forms are available. Advisor Feedback Forms will be available online.

4. Student Evaluation All 9 th grade students at your school who return the parental consent will participate in the LINKS program. Students will complete a pre- and post- 20-30 minute online Student Survey at the beginning and at the end of the academic year. This survey will include student demographic information and assess student knowledge, attitudes and satisfaction with school, advising information and services. Students will periodically be asked to complete a 4-question Student Feedback Form about lessons.

5. Advisor Evaluation An Advisor’s Log is available online for advisors to complete following lessons. At the end of the pilot phase, advisors will complete an online Advisor Survey of the LINKS program. The log and the survey are important for advisors to complete in order to make appropriate changes to lessons as needed for the next year.

6. Parent Evaluation At the end of the academic year, parents will be asked to complete and return a Parent Survey on their involvement with their child’s education. This survey will be available both online and in hard copy form for parents’ convenience. The Parent Survey is important to understand parent participation in their child’s learning and their knowledge of their child’s educational options.

7. Additional Evaluation Activities Participating students’ standardized test scores and attendance records will also be used to better understand the effectiveness of the LINKS program. An Implementation Checklist will be completed before and after the academic year to understand how the school is implementing the curriculum.

8. Evaluation Timeline

9. Evaluation Web links available at http://wvde.state.wv.us/forms/links-assessment / http://wvde.state.wv.us/forms/links-assessment