A team of Clinton School students spent the 2019-20 academic year working with the Arkansas Department of Education (ADE) Division of Public School Accountability. The team of Ryan Bell (Los Angeles, Calif.), Nikki Anderson (Fayetteville, Ark.), Jacob McGuire (Tuttle, Okla.), and Farrah Beck (Conway, Ark.) used surveys, focus groups, and interviews in White County to assess the impact and effectiveness of ADE stakeholder engagement efforts.
In choosing White County, the team wanted to find a county that was geographically near Little Rock, allowing them to have easy access to canvass the area, and contained multiple school districts. White County, which contains the Beebe, Bald Knob, and Searcy school districts and is roughly an hour drive away from Little Rock, was selected.
“The purpose of the survey was to get people’s perspective of ADE,” McGuire said. “What they knew about the organization, to collect their perceptions of ADE’s role in the state, and to determine if people were aware of how ADE utilizes its online tools.”
Dr. Alexandra Boyd, Director of Program Evaluation at ADE, said ADE wanted to use the team’s feedback to better understand how meaningfully engaged the parents are within the school district. If that engagement is lacking, she wanted to know what types of support and leadership the agency could provide to help increase meaningful two-way engagement.
Additionally, Boyd wanted to learn more about parents’ awareness of ADE’s wide range of online resources. Through a single website My School Info, parents can examine statistics and reports on public schools and school districts in Arkansas. Achievement assessments, demographics, growth, proficiency, college readiness, school expenditures, and more are available in this easy-to-use online tool.
“We have worked hard to make our online resources very user friendly,” Boyd said. “We want to know if the parents know the tools are available and if they understand them. If not, how can we improve our services?”
The team delivered its findings online on Tuesday, April 14.
“The overall experience has been extremely positive,” Boyd said. “The students were flexible and professional. They’ve offered a fresh perspective and rigorous approach to this project.”
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