Evaluation Expertise
AES has over twenty years’ experience evaluating federal and state funded education programs and working with experienced school practitioners and nationally renowned research institutions — currently with UCLA’s National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST).
The principal officers of AES, Elaine Rosales and David Kikoler, provide overall management of evaluation projects including assembling evaluation teams and working with school districts and AES evaluation team members to develop project goals, timelines and work plans, as well as to monitor the progress of project implementation and supervise and conduct formative and summative evaluations.
Working in collaboration with district and school staffs, AES develops a complete set of data collection instruments including site visit protocols and documentation templates. AES partners with CRESST for test score analysis, as well as survey design and analysis.
Learn more about the education programs evaluated by AES and the districts using our services…
Magnet Schools Assistance Program Evaluations
AES has special expertise in evaluating Magnet Schools Assistance Program projects. AES has evaluated 68 MSAP projects since 1996.
Learn more about the Magnet Schools Assistance Program projects evaluated by AES…
AES Rigorous Evaluations — Magnet Schools Assistance Program and Voluntary Public School Choice Program
AES has partnered with universities on 29 Rigorous/Evidence of Promise MSAP evaluations. This includes nineteen with its partner UCLA’s National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST).
AES’s evaluation work on the Voluntary Public School Choice (VPSC) program has been highlighted by the U.S. Department of Education. AES did rigorous evaluation studies on two VPSC projects for New Haven, CT (2002 – 2007, 2007 – 2012). Mr. Kikoler and Dr. David Silver, then a senior researcher at UCLA CRESST, presented AES’s 5 year rigorous study at the U.S. Department of Education’s Parental Options and Information Project Directors Conference in Washington DC in 2008. In addition, Mr. Kikoler presented AES’s evaluation work in New Haven on a national webcast sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education highlighting exemplary VPSC projects in 2008. AES was the only evaluator to participate in this webcast. Finally, AES’s VPSC work was featured in the January 31, 2008 issue of the Education Innovator (a U.S. Department of Education publication).
AES’s Work with UCLA’s National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST) — Magnet Program Research
An outgrowth of the AES’s evaluation work with UCLA’s National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing are several CRESST studies and articles, which have been cited in a recent publication by Janel George and Linda Darling-Hammond, Advancing Integration and Equity Through Magnet Schools, Learning Policy Institute, May 2021.These include a CRESST study highlighting the relationship between fidelity of implementation and student test scores in magnet schools in five school districts evaluated by the AES-CRESST team for the 2010 MSAP grant cycle. The study, Is There a Magnet-School Effect? A Multisite study of MSAP-Funded Magnet Schools (Jia Wang, Jonathan D. Schweig & Joan L. Herman, Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk (JESPAR) Vol. 22 , Iss. 2,2017) found positive relationships between higher level of fidelity of implementation and teacher support and improved student test scores. These are important findings in magnet program research. Study results were also published on the CRESST website in December 2014: Is There a Magnet School Effect? Using Meta-Analysis to Explore Variation in Magnet School Success. Additional CRESST articles, also highlighted in the Janel George and Linda Darling-Hammond publication, include: Wang, J., Herman, J., Fox, R. & Buchanan, N., “Magnet Schools: History, Description, and Effects” in Fox, R.A. & Buchanan, N.K. (Eds). (pp.158-179). The Wiley Handbook of School Choice, 2017; and Wang, J., Herman, J., and Hokterman, D., A Research Synthesis of Magnet School Effect on Student Outcomes: Beyond Descriptive Studies, Journal of School Choice, 12(2), 157-180, 2018.