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This week I spent quite a bit of time thinking about how each person in our group looks at deadlines. One individual is on the verge of a nervous breakdown (kidding) trying to understand and meet online or by phone anytime anyone is available, but does the least work. I am a little more structured and try to do a bit at a time, meet when convenient, but do miss a learning log date occasionally. The other person, of privilege and experience in this area, is not at all concerned and can whip up anything in an instant without regard to others opinions at the time. They have missed many opportunities to meet and discuss. What does this all mean to me? I feel as though if one has experience and power, they can re-assess the rules and create new guidelines. The other two non-experienced non-traditional students would never think of such a thing that may expose a weakness on our part. Just thinking......

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That is great that you see a way to discuss this in assessment! Ethics is the primary discussion as you point out.

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I did a quick search on how to meaningfully engage tertiary stakeholders and found nothing. Seems like an important area for future research! (Also, I just saw the Lewin resources you posted above-- thank you!) You've inspired me to think about adding a module on ethics in evaluation earlier in the course.

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This week we have been having some good discussion in the canvas thread about the need for stakeholder involvement throughout the process of design in assessment. Chapter 14 talks about the logic model and the benefits of this particular method of interaction during the process. I wonder what has the response been from tertiary stakeholders to results that do not necessarily include their input? We know this has not been a good way to approach the situation. My experience tells me that some individuals in particular cultures, that I have been familiar with, may not trust the results which would invalidate the work honestly. Diversity is one of those things that one would be remised to not include it, and crazy to think they can actually do it right and meet the needs of every group. I do honor the work some have done, including my dear mother, to help others learn even with incomplete resources, support, and facilities.

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I am humbled that you feel you could support me in that context. Thanks for the support throughout. I will not hesitate to dialog with you in the near future.

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Thanks for your reflection on group process.  You make such a good point about the things left unsaid.  I agree that your team is demonstrating significant growth.  Your topic is challenging and you're grappling well with that challenge and not shirking from it!
The dissertation project sounds very exciting! I hope to hear more about it as it unfolds. And if you need a committee member and my expertise is applicable, please let me know!
-S

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Communication issues as described prior with team III and the internet has been solved. What we needed it appears was more dialog about expectations. One team member felt as though items were not positioned properly but would change work as opposed to discuss it, another would not discuss issues and revert to being a quiet team member and not be heard, and of course I am all over the place talking about what I understand about the assignment but not looking for the unsaid. After a great discussion online everyone was able to verbalize their understanding and comfort with the process, which gave us focus and a renewed commitment to do well as a group. I feel as though the level of scholarship with this group can be seen as raising positively within the past two weeks after this interaction. Individual tasks appear to flow better with other research happening with other members. Meeting times have been increased as we look to understand one another's focus throughout the process. In this way, information and tasks are much easier to understand and approach. I have learned many things about assessment and group work that will be important in the near future.

This past Friday, I met online with my dissertation research team and was approved to conduct dissertation research at Peirce College looking at student success of non-traditional learners. The project appears to look like the assessment we are undertaking now with surveys, focus groups, and archival data. My attention to detail now will benefit me in the near future. Thank you for your advisement and instruction.

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Thanks for sharing this Fred. One thing that I'm learning in the facilitation of online courses is how differently each student relates to technology. Such a spectrum.

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It sounds like you and your group are struggling with the right things. Cultural competency is a complex, multi-faceted phenomenon and as such hard to reduce to observable behavior. That said, I think it's more amenable to observation than to test, for example. You might consider interviews with teachers and/or their students to get their perceptions of cultural competence.

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Thank you for pointing this out. I agree wholeheartedly. I spent quite a bit of time looking for resources that would support evaluators' ability to do this, but didn't find anything worth sharing. This seems like an area needing much more research.

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I find this week’s learning to be a tad baffling in many respects. My team is trying to create an instrument that may help us observe the cultural competency of teachers but it is not as easy as it sounds. When trying to assess the number of behaviors that may be displayed by the students in our instrument we have a hard time explaining what behaviors are important to the exercise. This is where diversity and cultural competency become hard to characterize. There are a million behaviors that could be displayed and a corresponding number of behaviors in response from the teacher. How does one characterize a certain behavior as representative of a cultural response? If the teacher is required to act in certain ways is it different for certain cultures? These are the questions we are wrestling with at the moment in this group.

In regards to observation, I am observing an interesting dynamic within our group in regards to communicating with technology. It does not always work well for many reasons. One member has consistently had a hard time starting in Zoom and uses many minutes to get caught up to the discussion. Another team member is always “having issues” with their computer and does not use it for online discussions. It would be nice to welcome their face. I on the other hand am always ready to meet online and am lucky my computer is working appropriately. I do notice as well that my team members text each other quite a bit and also use the phone on all communication. Our communication is not suffering, but it could use a shot in the arm.

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Frederick Collins
AEDT 5770 – Learning Log V
I spoke briefly in the discussion board about Chapter 7 and the area concerning cultural considerations on pages 218-219. My understanding of instruction is that it is done for the right reasons, it is done by individuals that care, it is to help, and that it is difficult to serve all needs. Educators have gone on for years about what is appropriate to teach and how, so there is no question about their commitment or ability to do this work. What I do not understand is the lack of educational discourse around issues on ways of knowing and appropriate strategies. There are many broad statements in the text about what people are and are not, but never any good research about identifying mysterious cultures who act in certain ways but they do not give us a basis for how to deal with the instructional issues. I also question characterizing a whole demographic in any way. The text says that the cultural context of the student is important to assessment but they do not offer any strategies of how we identify, relate, instruct, or understand certain cultures for the purpose of data collection. How are we to “make sure to determine what data collection method will work best for each participant population”?

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I feel as though there has to be more work initially with understanding, of self, of expectations, and of society. If we can have a real dialog across cultures we may find ways to support each other and lessen stress as we raise engagement.

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The mind is interesting. Some thing come very easy to me, like being opinionated, but judgement goes back to self esteem issues I believe. Thanks for your careful consideration always!

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Thank you for sharing. While I anticipated this exercise being uncomfortable for some, I did not do enough reflection about how social identity may impact this. This goes back to article from Week 1 about choice in evaluation.

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Oh!  I hope you are recovering comfortably. Please let me know how I can support you and your group.

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Great reflection on the challenge inherent in this tension. Are there ways you can imagine melding these ideals?

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I would like to comment on the ideas expressed in chapter 6 in the area of Multicultural Validity regarding selecting the appropriate evaluation design.  The text claims this method is an "accuracy of trustworthiness of understanding judgements, actions, and consequences across dimensions of cultural diversity". They say we must consider the culture of the organization and people throughout the design and implementation  stages. I am not sure how one has consistency of the evaluation when there is no rubric for how a communities values should be viewed. There is discussion of addressing the concerns of those being evaluated but no discussion on the concerns of the majority and how they intersect. People do not lose their beliefs after hearing the thoughts of another automatically. I am concerned about how these two deferring takes on the process; one from the evaluator's own understanding of the culture and one from those being evaluated. Not sure how those ideals intersect to produce a truthful instrument. The concern the text raises from this method is credibility in the cultural context. I feel as though there has to be a melding of ideals and not just concentrate on the particular cultural context, we have to also relate that to the real world, and how they intersect to develop new culture norms.

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I had an interesting discussion with my supervisor about his black peer, a vice president at an Oregon University. The man expressed he is having a hard time asking for money to do his job. A part of who he is. I too have had a similar psychological instance when asked to judge and grade myself on an assignment this week. My thought was that this was not good, not for me to do, and added to my compounded fear of failure as usual.  Directions were clear but my response was not. In the end I did not turn in that portion, although not purposefully.  The mind works in its own way and in a context that is real, personal, and archival. My guess is internally I chose to intellectually block the negative associations. I have not been judge fairly in this society and do not enjoy he experience in most fashions.

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If more information is needed.

Lewin, K. (1946). Action research and minority problems. Journal of social issues, 2(4), 34-46.
Lewin, K. (1951). Field theory in social science.

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This week really is starting out kind of crazy to say the least. After coming out of the hospital I am prepared and ready to learn. Homework and assignments are given much attention by me as always and the topics of discussion are interesting to me. I also like the calm respectful and supportive tone of our instructor (does not happen much for me). Things are good. Where did the problems come from this week? It appears that although we have instructions for the presentation assignment, my group is having issues with communication. Maria is lost and does not see my posts. I have had trouble finding out where to discuss, and Matthew is wondering what all this will mean. Is it that we are not reading the assignment well and not paying attention due to completion deadlines or is it that the assignment has a number of variables that are confusing to this particular group? This is a small group of 3 total and is major minority population. I wonder if ways of knowing and understanding will become talking points later. I wonder if technology will be a help or hindrance to this exercise for us.

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I was introduced to this Field Theory last year and was blown away that there really was a systematic approach to oppressing minorities in the inner city. We talk about that all the time in the "hood", but never had any proof until now. Google Scholar allowed me to find his article. This is relatively new information for me and that alone was enough for me.

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Frederick, thank you for this invitation to look into Lewin more carefully.  I wasn't familiar with this project and am looking forward to reading more.  Your post reminds me of Argyris' (1980) points about the necessity of aligning one's espoused theory and one's theory in use.  Any incongruence makes us skeptical, as it should.  Are there particular resources you might suggest with regard to Lewin's evaluations impact on urban minorities?
-SR

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I have received a good starting point in my understanding and insight into the topic of Evaluation in Organizations through the readings assigned for the week. Evaluation is described as the collection of data regarding questions or issues about a society. It is also described as a form of inquiry looking at how well something is working. All of the discussion deals with making people, organizations, and communities better. Herein lives my frustration with this text. The text appears to be concerned with the welfare of individuals, their involvement in the evaluative process, and there is discussion about individuals being the ones with the most investment. Early evaluative methods were described as important to public education, business, and mental health.

This text conveniently leaves out the work regarding Kurt Lewin, the father of social psychology who developed a pre-cursor to Behaviorism, with his work with Field Theory.

Kurt was hired by the government to give them a strategy for urban minorities and their effect on the economy and civics. His work like others dealt with the demand for surrogate measures of economic growth (House, 1993) Theory driven evaluation typically works with the stakeholders to develop a common understanding of how a program is presumed to solve the social problems, but that is not what happened with his research. I think he should have used a strengths based approach. His work conceivably set the strategy for minorities in inner cities. He theorized not doing any work to help these people, their environment, as they will get frustrated and stop trying to involve themselves with the majority profile, and the government can save on resources and help programs. Individuals were seen to behave differently according to the way in which tensions between perceptions of the self and of the environment were worked through. (Lewin 1951: 240) There was no work on their environment and the perception of self in the urban arena is still negative. Thanks?