Goals, Objectives, and Tasks! Oh my!

Grant evaluation is nothing like a scary walk in the woods but there is an awful lot of repetition of and return to the overarching goals of the project, it's underlying activity objectives, and the specific tasks that demonstrate incremental progress. It amounts to a cumbersome mantra. Oversight and coordination of the evaluation process rests with the Title V Steering Committee. As designated in the grant, they are: the vice president of academic affairs (Casandra Kakar), the vice president of student services (Yira Brimage), the project director (Seth Goodman), the institutional researcher (Jan Binder), the coordinator of the success center (Diana Mitchell), a faculty member (Mark Rosati), the college grants liaison (Sharon Halford), and the external evaluator. The external evaluator for the grant is William Baker and over the past two years, he and I have become increasingly relaxed during site visits as evidenced by our attire. In the first year, for both of us, suit and tie all the way, the entire day. At this point, Dockers and a dress shirt for me. For William, no tie and the suit jacket gets draped across a chair on arrival.

Yesterday was Mr. Baker's fifth visit to Phoenix College, to check on our progress, to meet with the Steering Committee, and to talk about goals, objectives and tasks. There were no flying monkeys. The day was roughly divided up into three areas of review: the STEM Scholars program, the status and overall progress of implementation activities, and the assessment strategies for demonstrating the impact of grant activities on student outcomes.

During the morning, Mr. Baker met with Laura Torres, the interim Math and Science Specialist, to gain a deeper understanding of the week-to-week activities she is involved in with supporting our cohort of STEM students. She pulled out a 4-inch binder and walked him through the activities of the cohort, her strategies for engaging them in campus life activities, and supporting them in developing their assets for college success and career exploration. We were fortunate enough to have five STEM Scholars visit with us and share their personal experiences at Phoenix College and in the program. They all had profoundly positive remarks to share about Laura's proactive involvement and support and the benefits of the program and the resources it provides to them. The session transformed into a brainstorming session for prospective improvements going forward into the 2011-12 school year. The students take the cohort program very seriously and demonstrated this with their eagerness and willingness to improve it for the next wave of students to join their ranks. "Wow… that's fantastic… I'm really impressed…" Mr. Baker started to sound like a broken record. Kudos certainly go to Laura for this accomplishment. She came in at the start of the semester with no time to prepare. She hit the ground running and won the trust and confidence of our student cohort one member at a time.

Ongoing progress is being made in most, if not all, objectives. Underspending of funds and implementation data for mini-grant projects are areas where improvement and accelerated progress are needed. We explored the status of reporting for mini-grantees, payment procedures for contracts, and other institutional factors and policies with an aim to improve implementation by the end of Year Three, in September. The site visit concluded with a formal meeting of the 8-member Steering Committee, a subset of the more commonly known Title V Steering Council, which also includes a panel of 11 faculty advisors and a select group of 9 resources members. Considerable discussion centered on the reporting and framing of retention and persistence data and correlating differing levels of cohort data. Some additional strategies may be explored to demonstrate progress and validate improvement in the coming year. Additionally, there will be a push to acquire more complete information on the deliverables from faculty mini-grant projects and the associated student learning outcomes.

The "dashboard" that was very helpful in facilitating conversations about implementation status, progress, and assessment yet received mixed reviews and will likely be revised.  Mark Rosati has a particular appreciation for bar graphs over pie charts.  Color key (generally): green = completed, yellow = on track, and red = lagging.

Near the conclusion of the Steering Committee meeting, Mr. Baker excused himself to meet his taxi and make his way to the airport. Apparently the cab driver couldn't "make it" so I packed Mr. Baker into my CR-V to rush him to his plane. He had many compliments for the day's visit and the staff and faculty involved in the grant. We shifted into some light conversation. He commented on how his golf game is declining… and then we somehow ended up talking about the grant's goals, and objectives, and tasks again.

Mr. Baker will return for another site visit in early fall 2011.