The Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute

During the past ten years numerous individuals and funders have assisted in the development of the Institute’s approach to evaluation generally and with specific questionnaires, as well as in the analysis and interpretation of data from surveys conducted since 1982. Mitchell Katz helped to create the Institute’s first teacher surveys and, working in 1981-1982, also analyzed the results and helped to prepare reports. Many of the items from those early surveys were retained for use in later questionnaires, between 1986 and 1990. Peter J. Casarella also contributed survey items related to his research on Institute curriculum units conducted in 1985-1986.

Since 1985 William Kessen has helped guide the Institute’s approach to evaluation, the design of the surveys whose results are reported here, and the interpretation of results. Between 1985 and 1987 Elizabeth Leavell assisted in questionnaire de velopment and recorded in a detailed way the relationship among questions included in the various surveys. From 1987 to the present Marion Kessen has had major responsibility for managing and analyzing the data from all the surveys the Institute administ ered between 1982 and 1990. Her painstaking and careful work has been assisted by several Yale undergraduates: Carla Eckhardt, Frank Roschitz, and Justin Scott worked on the organization and presentation of data; and Frank Roschitz assisted as well in d ata analysis.

Since 1986 Gita Z. Wilder has provided invaluable assistance in helping the Institute to formulate its overall approach to evaluation and in advising the development of particular surveys and reports. She reviewed several drafts of the present r eport and made suggestions which are incorporated here. With respect to the present report, Jeffrey Dolvin prepared an early draft of lengthy material. Arthur Chung checked data in that early draft and prepared the graphs and charts which are included i n these pages. Erica C. Brossard laid out pages of early drafts of the Progress Report, assisted by Josh Wang. Margaret Davey completed the layout of the present version.

The Institute’s earliest work in evaluation was supported by the Connecticut Humanities Council and the National Endowment for the Humanities. A three-year grant from the Rockefeller Foundation allowed the Institute to develop the surveys which were administered between 1986 and 1990. In 1987 a grant from the College Board permitted the Institute to intensify its work in analyzing and interpreting data from these surveys. The Institute’s work in evaluation has been significantly assisted also by support from the Ford Foundation and, most recently, the DeWitt Wallace-Reader’s Digest Fund.

At every important turn—from frequent examinations of the Institute’s approach in evaluation, to the formulation of specific items in questionnaires, to the interpretation of survey results—and at many points in between, the New Haven teachers wh o have served in leadership positions in the Institute since 1981 have provided indispensable assistance to this work in evaluation. That is, they were participants at many stages in a collaborative process leading to the present report. More than thirt y-eight individual teachers contributed to the Institute’s evaluation in these ways while they served as Institute Coordinators, or in other capacities, during the past decade.