Accountability and Assessment in School Counseling CHAPTER 3

GOAL To promote comprehensive evaluation strategies, understandable informative accountability information, evidence-based practice, and reasonable assessment expectations for school counselors.

DATA-DRIVEN YET SERVICE ORIENTED EVALUATION - Gathering information or data about the effectiveness of one’s work as a school counselor. Use-of-time data Process data Perception data Outcome data Accountability Evidence-based practice Assessment

BUILDING A CONVENIENT AND COMPREHENSIVE ACCOUNTABILITY FRAMEWORK Convenient and Efficient Evaluation – Time can be better managed and convenience enhanced if data collection and reporting are streamlined and systematic. Comprehensive Accountability Data – Collecting comprehensive data is a desirable characteristic of the evaluation/accountability function because the programs provided by school counselors have many facets, and school counselors have a varied set of stakeholders to serve.

NEEDS ASSESSMENT DATA Whose needs should be assessed? How should needs be assessed? Which needs assessment strategy should be used? How will the results be interpreted to stakeholders? Determine what information should be asked of stakeholders. Acquire desired information.

PRESENTING EVALUATION DATA SUCCESSFULLY AND ACHIEVING ACCOUNTABILITY The information is summarized and organized systematically. The presentation is clear, concise, and understandable to stakeholders. Reports are as brief as possible without omitting valuable information.

ACCOUNTABILITY AS A MEANS OF ENHANCING PUBLIC RELATIONS Of the programs offered by the schools, counseling is usually less well understood by the public than teaching and administering. This circumstance challenges school counselors to inform the various stakeholders about their goals, programs, and accomplishments. Strategies for influencing public opinion are numerous: Advisory committees Accountability conferences Formal written reports

DESIGNING A COMPREHENSIVE ASSESSMENT STRATEGY TO ENHANCE INDIVIDUAL STUDENT PLANNING Knowledge about principles of measurement Scales and scoring systems Reliability and validity Qualitative or nonstandardized assessments Helping students understand and process assessment data

COMPREHENSIVE SCHOOL COUNSELING PROGRAM COMPONENTS Develop a plan for collecting comprehensive evaluation data and using it in a manner that will achieve accountability and evidence for one’s practice in a hypothetical school setting. Develop brief needs assessment forms to be completed by (a) teacher, (b) parents, and (c) students (select a grade level for the students). Develop one prospective goal for each of the following simulations that can be measured with objective, quantitative data: (a) A classroom guidance program designed to provide students with information about financial aid for higher education. (b) A counseling relationship in which the counselor is working with a student who wants to be more successful academically. Create an inventory of quantitative and qualitative assessments that would be most useful for eighth grade students engaged in individual planning about their immediate transition to ninth grade and a future potential transition to postsecondary education.

REFLECTING ABOUT DATA-DRIVEN DECISION MAKING The content of this chapter places a heavy emphasis on data-driven decision making. How convinced are you that this is important? What doubts, if any, do you have? If supportive, what convinced you? What challenges does the emphasis on data-driven decision making have for you in your current counselor education training program (e.g., tests and measurements and statistics courses)? How do you plan to respond to the challenges?

APPLICATION TO TECHNOLOGY Use Google docs to create an assessment survey. Find a free online career assessment, take it, and analyze the face validity of the instrument (i.e., does it appear to do what it purports to do?).