Strategic Planning in Charles City, Virginia

When Charles City Public Schools in Virginia was looking for a consultant to assist with strategic planning, they contacted the Shaffer Evaluation Group. We're working closely with school district officials in the development of outcome-focused performance measures that will enable them to assess progress toward accomplishing their strategic goals and objectives. We look forward to continuing to work with them on collecting and/or analyzing performance data across the strategic plan period, and reporting results in a manner that is highly visible and easily accessible to school district staff, students, parents, and the Charles City community.

Strategic planning is more important than ever for school districts who are working to succeed in the face of multiple internal and external challenges. A well-crafted strategic plan clearly defines what an organization intends to achieve. Bryson (2011) defines strategic planning as a “deliberate, disciplined approach to producing fundamental decisions and actions that shape and guide what an organization is, what it goes, and why.” Strategic planning is a process that requires stakeholders to engage with one another, consider where they are, where they want to be, and how to get there (Bryson & Alston, 2004). Evaluators are often asked to support school districts and organizations with their strategic planning process due to their expertise in data collection and performance measurement. Evaluator support may include: data collection from stakeholders and associated analyses during the planning stage; development of SMART performance measures used monitor progress of selected strategies or objectives; and creating data collection guides used by school district staff during implementation. A well-crafted strategic plan should effectively link the organization’s stakeholders to the overarching mission and vision of the school district with clear and measurable performance outcomes of the strategic plan.

Evaluation Capacity Building with AmeriCorps

As evaluators, we often fulfill a variety of roles within partner organizations. In recent years, accountability expectations continue to increase, while budgets have often declined. As a result, our work as facilitators for building internal capacity within our partner organizations has become a more frequent request. Such work is defined within the literature as Evaluation Capacity Building (ECB). Stockdill, Balzeman, and Compton (2002) define ECB as “the intentional work to continuously create and sustain organizational processes that make quality evaluation and its uses routine.” This year, the SEG team had the opportunity to support Virginia AmeriCorps programs through small group virtual training events and 1:1 technical assistance to enhance understanding of theory of change, evidence-based practices, performance measurement, and data collection in order to meet the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) evaluation expectations. By increasing internal evaluation capacity, programs can ensure they are collecting high quality evidence to refine their interventions, demonstrate impact, and “tell the story” of their work.

New Research Associate Joins Team

Diana Theisinger joins the Shaffer Evaluation Group as a Research Associate. Diana, a doctoral candidate in Curriculum and Educational Technology at the College of William & Mary, has served as

managing editor of The William & Mary Educational Review since 2014. Her approach to educational research and evaluation is informed by her experience teaching English/language arts at middle and high school and working as an assistive technology coordinator. During her time at William & Mary, she has performed both quantitative and qualitative research and presented her research at state and national conferences. Diana holds a B.A. in English from Texas A&M University and an M.Ed. in Secondary Education (English) from Mercer University in Atlanta, GA. During her first six months at the Shaffer Evaluation Group, she will work on several evaluation studies involving military-connected students. Welcome aboard, Diana!