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Values in Action Schools Project: Evaluation Summit

VASP Evaluation Summit_participantsThe Evaluation Summit, the third national session for the Values in Action Schools Project (VASP) was held in Melbourne on 16 October 2009.

Unlike the national briefing sessions, the Summit participants included parents and students. There were over 70 participants with two teacher representatives and generally two parent and two student representatives from each of the 14 school clusters that attended, six university advisor (UA) colleagues from universities across Australia, thirteen state and territory Values Education Contact Officers, Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations representatives, project academic advisors and consultants and the Education Services Australia VASP team.

The objectives of the Evaluation Summit were:

  • to share the outcomes from the VASP projects from across Australia
  • to participate in a Most Significant Change (MSC) story selection process
  • to be informed about and prepare for final VASP project activities, including cluster final reports and the project final report
  • to acknowledge and celebrate project outcomes

 

Each cluster prepared a poster for the Summit summarizing their project intentions and key outcomes and gave a brief presentation elaborating on the four questions the poster addressed:

  • What were the goals of our values project?
  • Why were these the selected goals?
  • What did we do in our project?
  • What was achieved?

 

VASP Evaluation Summit_studentsA primary purpose of the Summit was to finalise the MSC process of selecting stories that demonstrated the most significant changes to school communities resulting from the VASP work. Each cluster had selected four MSC stories (one from each cohort of parent, student and teacher plus one more) from their school community to go to the MSC panel. Fifteen of these stories were selected by the panel for the Summit. Dr Tracey Delaney led the Summit process which consisted of groups deciding which of these stories demonstrated the most significant change and the reasons for its selection. Emerging themes and key helping factors that caused the changes were compiled. These elements and the final selection of stories will inform the final report for the project.

The majority of the students at the Summit worked in small groups, with Roger Holdsworth and Nada Jackson, to create artworks based on changes exemplified through some of the MSC student stories. At the end of the day the students presented their artworks to the rest of the Summit participants.

Participant evaluations expressed high levels of satisfaction with the evaluation summit program. They appreciated the opportunity to hear about the experiences and challenges of different clusters, to discuss and reflect on the MSC stories and to admire the student work and their depth of understanding.