Below is the text from the Executive Summary from this report. The complete Executive Summary, with pictures, can be downloaded from the bottom of this page.
Litzsinger Road Ecology Center
Executive Summary 2007-2008
The primary finding from this evaluation was that the Litzsinger Road Ecology Center (LREC) strategy of extending relationships with educators turned a corner, and showed some evidence of success. For the past three years, LREC has been pursuing a strategy of building more comprehensive relationships with selected educators and schools, in order to deepen the impacts of their programming. At the same time, LREC has conducted evaluations of their programs. During the first year of evaluation, educators were found to be enthusiastic about the program, and wanted more from LREC in terms of quantity and variety of programming, including an extended relationship with LREC staff. Last year, the evaluation showed that educators were more immersed in place-based education (PBE) than in previous years, yet this immersion had not
yet trickled down to many changes in educator practice. This year of the evaluation, educator practice around PBE and student stewardship behavior showed clear, positive trends of improved impact.
Additional findings included:
Ø The extended relationship with LREC staff enhanced educator practice;
Ø Inquiry-based learning, modeled by LREC, deepened student learning;
Ø LREC extended into more grades and classrooms in some schools; and
Ø Schoolyards were the central focus for most conservation efforts by educators.
The evaluation collected data from the following sources:
· Interviews with a purposive sample of eight educators who had varying degrees of interaction with LREC staff during 2007-2008; and
· On-line surveys from educators who had any relationship with LREC, or who taught at a school that had taken students to LREC in the 2007-2008 school year (99 invitations were sent out, and 60 responses were collected, representing a 61% response rate).
A more detailed discussion of this evaluation’s findings is presented below. Evaluators also provided LREC staff with a document which elaborates on findings, for their internal use.
Findings and Discussion
Extended relationship with LREC staff enhanced educator practice
“I would say a big part of [the LREC program] was the education of the teachers. [The LREC staff member] has got a way of gently pushing you to try new things and she’s very good at that. I wasn’t in my comfort zone in the beginning, but then I gained a lot more confidence.” - LREC Educator
Both survey data and interview data indicated that LREC helped educators to grow professionally. Almost all educators interviewed reported that communication with LREC staff assisted them in extending what they did at LREC into their classroom. Educators believed that LREC projects fit in well with their class curricula and with science standards. In addition, half of the educators interviewed noted that LREC staff helped them to teach concepts more deeply, by making curriculum ideas more concrete and seeing ideas through to completion. One way that LREC staff accomplished this goal was working with educators to plan classroom lessons that built on and extended LREC site work. Survey data indicated that more involvement with LREC was associated with higher outcomes for 15 out of 28 outcomes surveyed. This is a striking increase
from last year’s survey data, where only 4 outcomes approached statistical significance, and indicated that LREC seemed to have more of an effect on educators than it had in past years.
Inquiry-based learning, modeled by LREC, deepened student learning
“The [LREC] project reinforced the inquiry-based learning and questioning strategies that I have been working to implement. LREC helps me meet the goal of scientific investigation and reasoning [with my students].”- LREC Educator
Most educators reported that they thought the type of inquiry-based learning done at LREC impacted their students by increasing student comfort outdoors, observational skills, and engagement in learning. In interviews, many educators attributed these differences in student learning to time students spent outside (both at LREC and in their own schoolyards), doing hands-on work, as well as teaching students how to be inquisitive and to ask questions. Most educators who responded to the survey (N=60) reported multiple ways that LREC affected their students, including connecting book learning to real-world learning (68%), increasing student engagement with nature (87%), and deepening students’ understanding of ecology (80%).
LREC extended into more grades and classrooms in some schools
“The cool thing was figuring out how to integrate [LREC] curriculum-wide from K to 5. This year is the first year all the grades have come on. Each year they go they have a different experience and it becomes a more familiar place, and a very enriching experience.”- LREC Educator
This year LREC expanded its reach a bit more into some schools. LREC staff members began intentionally looking for ways to bring in more classes and grades in the schools where they had at least two classrooms involved. They especially sought out opportunities to bridge gaps between grades, so that there could be a developmental progression in working with LREC, and hoped to bring in additional classes next year. However, in the current evaluation there were still several models for how schools and educators worked with LREC, including having only one or two teachers at a school involved in LREC programming. No clear pattern emerged from the data as to whether one model was more effective than another.
Schoolyards were the central focus for most conservation efforts by educators
“LREC has complemented and supported our children's project to reduce erosion in our playground stream garden and to restore native riparian flora to what was an asphalt play surface next to a chain link fence. LREC contributed curriculum planning collaboration, field study experiences, native seeds, and other support.” - LREC Educator
Many educators, including everyone interviewed, reported that LREC helped in some way with their schoolyards, from identifying and providing native plant species to helping a student plan a rain garden. Educators were quite proud of these efforts in their schoolyards. In one school, the community helped to plant a vegetable garden, and the school planned on serving the food grown in the garden to the students. Yet, educators thought that LREC had little effect on what they described as conservation awareness or efforts beyond the schoolyard (e.g. recycling). Several educators also claimed that LREC had positively impacted their own personal comfort level and interest in the outdoors, especially the awareness of native plant species.
Conclusions and Recommendations
This evaluation indicated that an extended relationship with educators did enhance their professional practice, personal interest in PBE, student learning, and student comfort level in the outdoors. Some of the areas that showed less impact included student conservation, and impact on whole schools. In order to track whether there is continued improvement in the areas described above, and impacts in other areas, recommendations are offered below.
Recommendations for next phase of LREC evaluation include:
ü Systematically track interactions between LREC staff and school educators
ü Focus evaluation data collection on whole schools
ü Consider revising the application for schools
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