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Kansas Early Learning Collaborative: Evaluation Project

(3/09) Collaborating Agencies:

1. Kansas Association for Child Care and Resource Referral Agencies
2. Kansas Head Start Association
3. Kansas Children’s Service League
4. Kansas Division for Early Childhood
5. Kansas Association for Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health
6. Kansas Parents as Teachers Association

This one-year grant received by Christopher L. Smith, Ph.D., is funded by Kansas Association for Child Care and Resource Referral Agencies. The period of funding is January 1, 2009-December 31, 2009.

Todd Little, Ph.D. is co-principal investigator. Project staff include: Waylon Howard and Xan Wedel, Lawrence and Laura Cruz, Parsons.

Project Summary

Six statewide early learning organizations (listed above) have joined together as the Kansas Early Learning Collaborative.  The Collaborative will provide leadership to support a seamless, family-friendly continuum of services, including Early Learning, Family Support, Special Needs/Early Intervention, Health, Mental Health and Nutrition. The target population will be at-risk children and families, focused on underserved areas of the state.  The Collaborative will unify, strengthen and expand services to address all five goals in the KECCS plan; enhance collaboration among the Collaborative partners and their members and bring together additional partners dedicated to a common purpose.

The KU evaluation contract will provide staff and services to effectively deliver evaluation services in the areas of data collection, management, analysis, and reporting. Three areas of work include:

1. In collaboration with the KELC service partners, the evaluator will develop and implement evaluation tools and processes to measure:
1. Target population;
2. Resource and inputs;
3. Activities to estimate numbers and types of services provided by all partners;
4. Program and community contexts; and
5. Outcomes measurement tools and processes.

2. Collection, analysis, and reporting of evaluation data
1. Target population data;
2. Resource and inputs data (cost/impact information, return on investment, etc.);
3. Activity data to estimate numbers and types of services provided by all partners;
4. Program and community context data including standard community assessment documents for all counties and programs served by partners. These documents will include state-of-the-art (GIS) mapping technology to produce visual demonstrations of geographic dispersion of a variety of indicators; and
5. Outcomes data.

3. Facilitation of evaluation capacity building processes
1. Provide overall evaluation leadership and facilitation for the KELC project.
2. Collaborate with the KELC partners to create and maintain all data collection, analysis, and reporting tools and systems.
3. Collaborate with the KELC partners and stakeholders to create and maintain systems of evaluation data utilization and sense-making.