In this post, the concept of evaluation and research is explored through a visual metaphor of the farmer vs the professional food taster. The ideas is that the food taster (evaluator) is tasting the final product and does not have the same vested interest as the farmer (researcher). The food taster has to determine whether material meets the wants and needs of the stakeholders (the eaters). This artifact demonstrates my competency in understanding and implementing PLO 3 in my professional practice, by reflecting the development of my understanding of the role of the evaluator and how evaluators develop effective evaluation strategies. In completing this discussion post, I learned much of the role of evaluators and learned how to further delineate my role in evaluation, which will be useful as I encounter stakeholders in my professional practice of librarianship.

EDTECH 505 Module 5 Discussion Post

This post discusses the EETT and NSSME evaluations performed by the U.S. Department of Education. It explores how formal evaluations are preformed when the stakeholders are known, and identifies the components of an evaluation. The second half of the post, I describe the questions I will use to evaluate, and the data collection instrument. This post meets PLO 3 by describing how I created an evaluation plan for the final evaluation project for EDTECH 505. The evaluation plan included targeted questions that evaluate how librarians used technology to meet user needs during the period of pandemic-related library closure in 2020 and whether services effectively met user needs, and identified areas of improvement. I will use similar evaluations to test performance of library programs in my professional practice.

EDTECH 505: Module 6 Discussion

I completed a plan for an formative assessment that would be performed by subject matter experts to determine the usability of the final course. The formative evaluation also asked my professional evaluators to determine what would make the course more effective, what technological aspects of the course could be improved to make the course more effective. This evaluation plan helped me understand the in-process aspect of formative evaluation, where most prior experience was summative. Testing the effectiveness of technologies in curriculum and instruction is an integral part of PLO 3, and this evaluation also facilitates effective evaluation and assessment strategies by describing the process of my evaluation plan in detail. In my professional career, I will collaborate with other members of my academic community to determine whether technological learning materials and methods meet the needs of adult learners.

EDTECH 512 Formative Evaluation

The summative evaluation for the course I prepared for EDTECH 512 was composed of a final research paper which students will complete to determine whether they are citing the sources for their paper correctly (that is, according the 7th edition of the APA citation manual). The summative evaluation also discusses (in narrative form) the post-course evaluation. The summative evaluation plan guided me into combining assessment (testing to see how well learners absorbed material) and evaluation (seeing if learners were satisfied with what they learned). The summative evaluation plan demonstrates my mastery of PLO 3 showing how I plan to evaluate whether end-users of the proposed course were satisfied and actually learned the material. I will use both evaluation and assessment in my professional practice to determine whether a program met the intended learning objectives.

EDTECH 512 Summative Evaluation

The Bias Free language quiz is a formative assessment taken by course participants during the LIBR 200 course. This assessment measures their learning and ability to know what is acceptable language to use in their assignments and projects. The intent of this quiz is to decrease the use of biased language and help students understand what are acceptable fonts per the APA citation style, 7th edition.

This quiz demonstrates mastery of PLO 2 by show how I will use a technology-supported approach (Google Forms) to assess learner knowledge of bias-free language and acceptable APA 7 fonts. I will use such assessments in my professional practice to determine how learners absorbed material.

EDTECH 512 Bias-Free Language and Font Quiz

The Evaluation Project, completed in EDTECH 505, had me perform an evaluation of how effectively Albertsons Library transitioned from in-person to remote reference services during the periods of closure and restricted access.

In my creation of this evaluation, I demonstrated my mastery of PLO 5 in determining the effectiveness of technologies in instruction, or in this case, instructional support. This evaluation project included a survey of University librarians who helped me understand how the migration to completely remote service affected the quality of reference interviews, in-depth research consultations, and staff adherence to RUSA standards. The evaluation included areas for improvement identified in the survey. This is the first time I have actually evaluated anything, as opposed to simply creating a plan to evaluate.

In my professional work as an academic librarian, evaluation remains important for institutional stakeholders to understand how services are impacted by changes, and future surveys will include similar data-analysis methods and questions. Future work in evaluation will focus on improving response rates and improving questions (through more open-ended questions) in evaluations to better understand the needs of learners.

EDTECH 505 Evaluation Project