Teacher Training: Status and Participants' Views of Delta Teachers
Academy (Letter Report, 06/29/95, GAO/RCED-95-208).

Pursuant to a congressional request, GAO reviewed the Delta Teachers
Academy program, focusing on: (1) Academy activities and expenditures;
and (2) the views of Academy participants on program effectiveness.

GAO found that: (1) the Department of Agriculture's funding for the
Delta Teachers Academy has nearly doubled from $2 million in fiscal year
(FY) 1994 to almost $4 million in FY 1995; (2) the Academy expects to
increase the number of teacher training days from about 5,000 for 371
teachers in FY 1994 to 12,000 days for 665 teachers in FY 1995; (3)
teachers participating in the Academy program generally view it as
effective in increasing the understanding of academic subjects and
providing new teaching skills, and feel the Academy provides benefits
and opportunities beyond those of other teacher training programs; and
(4) the National Faculty has not yet evaluated the impact of the Academy
on participants' teaching practices, but it is planning more
comprehensive evaluations of the program's impact and effectiveness.

--------------------------- Indexing Terms -----------------------------

 REPORTNUM:  RCED-95-208
     TITLE:  Teacher Training: Status and Participants' Views of Delta 
             Teachers Academy
      DATE:  06/29/95
   SUBJECT:  Teacher education
             Aid for education
             College faculty
             Elementary education
             Secondary education
             Educational programs
             Education program evaluation
             Education or training
             Administrative costs
IDENTIFIER:  Arkansas
             Illinois
             Kentucky
             Louisiana
             Mississippi
             Missouri
             Tennessee
             
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Cover
================================================================ COVER

Report to Congressional Requesters

June 1995

TEACHER TRAINING - STATUS AND
PARTICIPANTS' VIEWS OF DELTA
TEACHERS ACADEMY

GAO/RCED-95-208

Status and Views of Delta Teachers Academy


Abbreviations
=============================================================== ABBREV

  GAO - General Accounting Office
  USDA - U.S.  Department of Agriculture

Letter
=============================================================== LETTER


B-361474

June 29, 1995

Congressional Committees

As requested by the Senate and House conferees for the fiscal year
1995 U.S.  Department of Agriculture (USDA) appropriations act, we
reviewed the Delta Teachers Academy program, which is funded
primarily by the Department.  The Academy, established in 1992, is
intended to help address the educational needs of the Lower
Mississippi Delta--one of the poorest, least developed regions in the
nation.  The Academy seeks to address these needs by improving the
quality of elementary and secondary school teaching in the region. 

In May 1994, we issued an interim report on the program.\1

This review (1) provides updated information on Academy activities
and expenditures and (2) describes the views of Academy participants
on the program's effectiveness, including its impact on teaching
skills and subject area knowledge. 


--------------------
\1 Delta Teachers Academy (GAO/RCED-94-213R, May 19, 1994). 


   RESULTS IN BRIEF
------------------------------------------------------------ Letter :1

USDA funding for the Delta Teachers Academy has nearly doubled from
$2 million in fiscal year 1994 to almost $4 million in fiscal year
1995.  During this period, the Academy expects to increase the number
of teacher training days by 130 percent, from over 5,000 training
days for 371 elementary and secondary school teachers in fiscal year
1994 to over 12,000 training days for 665 teachers in fiscal year
1995. 

Teachers participating in the Academy have generally given it high
marks.  Their evaluations show that the Academy is viewed as
effective in both increasing the understanding of academic subjects
and providing new teaching skills--the Academy's two primary
objectives.  In addition, teachers noted that the program provided
benefits and opportunities beyond those of other teacher training
programs.  They noted, for example, that the university scholars who
trained the teachers brought in new ideas and perspectives from
around the country and that the Academy provided longer-term and more
continuous development opportunities for participants. 


   BACKGROUND
------------------------------------------------------------ Letter :2

The National Education Goals, developed in 1991, and the Goals 2000: 
Educate America Act underscore,\2 among other things, the (1)
importance of providing elementary and secondary school teachers with
professional development programs and (2) educational emergency that
exists in rural areas with large concentrations of children living in
poverty.  The act notes that rural schools often lack the means to
effectively address the needs of these children and that intensive
efforts should be made to overcome the problems of geographic
isolation, inadequate financial resources, and other impediments to
educational success. 

The Delta Teachers Academy seeks to address these concerns by
renewing and enhancing the subject area knowledge and teaching skills
of elementary and secondary teachers in the Lower Mississippi Delta
region.  This region, comprising the Delta areas of seven
states--Arkansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi,
Missouri, and Tennessee--is predominantly rural and characterized by
poverty and other impediments to education.  For example, 33 percent
of the Delta's children live in poverty, compared with 21 percent for
the United States overall.  (App.  II shows the locations of children
living in poverty in the United States.)

The National Faculty,\3 an independent, nonprofit educational
corporation, launched the Delta Teachers Academy as a pilot program
in 1992 with a $500,000 grant from the Department of Education.  In
1993, the Academy was continued on a limited basis with about
$220,000 in funding from the BellSouth Foundation and the Winthrop
Rockefeller Foundation.  This funding was used to support 8 of the 10
original pilot program's teacher teams in 1993 and 1994.  In 1994 and
1995, the Academy was expanded with grants of $1.92 million and $3.78
million, respectively, from USDA.\4

The Delta Teachers Academy does not operate its own facilities. 
Rather, it conducts a series of 2-day teacher development sessions
with university scholars and teachers in participating school
districts throughout the academic year, followed by 2-week "summer
institutes" on college campuses in the region.  Participants
beginning the program in 1995 will receive about 20 days of training
annually for 3 consecutive years. 

The 163 National Faculty scholars who have planned and taught the
sessions in fiscal years 1994-95 are experts in their academic fields
and come from over 90 universities and colleges throughout the United
States.  The institutions represented include Harvard University,
Spelman College, Stanford University, and the University of Missouri. 
The scholars use a variety of instructional methods--lectures,
discussion groups, field trips, films, readings, and laboratory and
other hands-on workshops--to communicate both the subject matter and
pedagogy--the science of teaching.  The scholars are encouraged to
relate to the teachers as peers rather than as students-- intending
to create a collegial environment for developing knowledge and
skills. 

The program's selection process begins with the National Faculty
staff asking chief state school officers to recommend school
districts that will be best able to benefit from the program, using
the criteria of academic need and the clear support of local
administrators.  Officials of these districts in turn select one or
more disciplines to be addressed and the teachers who will
participate.  The Faculty requests that participants have at least 2
years of teaching experience and the potential for becoming leaders
who will disseminate to other teachers the skills and knowledge
learned in the Academy. 

Teachers meet with program staff before their training sessions to
select the topics to be covered and to develop an agenda to meet
their particular needs.  Teachers participating in the Academy are
encouraged to develop teaching plans incorporating their newly
acquired skills so that they can serve as resources for other
teachers in their districts. 


--------------------
\2 The President and the nation's governors established the National
Education Goals to focus public attention on restructuring schools
and increasing expectations for improving students' performance.  The
Goals 2000:  Educate America Act of 1994, P.L.  103-227, expanded the
number of National Education Goals from six to eight. 

\3 The National Faculty was founded in 1968 by the National Endowment
for the Humanities, under the sponsorship of Phi Beta Kappa, the
American Council of Learned Societies, and the American Council on
Education.  Its purpose is to help American schools strengthen
teaching in the humanities, arts, and sciences. 

\4 The Academy continues to receive funding from nonfederal sources. 
As of June 6, 1995, it had received a total of about $240,000 in
private funds to start a 3-year program for a team of teachers in
Memphis. 


   ACTIVITIES OF THE ACADEMY
------------------------------------------------------------ Letter :3

The number of teachers, teacher training days, and counties and
parishes involved in the program has increased since the Academy's
first year of operation in 1992, as shown in table 1.  (See app.  IV
for the counties and parishes of the participating teachers.) In
1995, the National Faculty expects to provide 12,037 training days. 
This is more than twice the number of teacher training days provided
in the previous year. 



                           Table 1
           
             Academy's Training Activity, Fiscal
                        Years 1992-95

Training delivered              1992  1993\a    1994  1995\b
----------------------------  ------  ------  ------  ------
Teachers                         100      80     371     665
Participating counties and        36      32      55      65
 parishes
Teacher training days            930     376   5,238  12,037
2-week summer institutes           2       0      10      14
2-day academic sessions           10      25      95     215
------------------------------------------------------------
\a Funding for 1993 was entirely from nonfederal sources. 

\b Estimated. 

Source:  The National Faculty. 

For the 215 2-day sessions in 1995, teams of about 15 teachers each
will participate in a series of academic sessions with a different
scholar leading each session.  The 14 2-week summer institutes will
begin in June 1995 on Delta college campuses.  Each institute will
host about 40 teachers and be led by three to four scholars.  As of
June 6, 1995, the Academy had conducted about 80 percent of its 215
planned 2-day sessions and had scheduled all of the remaining 2-day
sessions and summer institutes.  In addition, in May 1995, the
National Faculty began providing grants on a pilot basis to teacher
teams participating in the Academy to lead teacher development
sessions in their school districts. 

Over one-third of the 1994 and 1995 training sessions focused on math
and/or science, with the remainder focused on English, history,
geography, reading, and other subjects.  The scientific sessions
include agricultural issues, for example, the composition of soils
and the use of pesticides and fertilizers. 

Much of the training is interdisciplinary--several subjects are
combined to view issues and solve problems.  For example, in a 1994
math-science summer institute, one laboratory session demonstrated
how to model pollution in lakes using matrices and linear equations. 
Another session demonstrated how the movements and behaviors of
crawfish in a tank are quantified and how statistics help scientists
interpret experimental results. 


   ACADEMY EXPENDITURES
------------------------------------------------------------ Letter :4

As stipulated in the conference report, USDA provided $3.94 million
for the Delta Teachers Academy program for fiscal year 1995, nearly
doubling the $2 million provided in 1994.  Of the fiscal year 1995
amount, $3.78 million went to the National Faculty to implement the
Academy's activities.  The Department retained $157,000 for
administrative expenses.\5

As shown in figure 1, the National Faculty plans to spend about 47
percent of the $3.78 million on the (1) National Faculty's salaries,
wages, and fringe benefits and (2) program's indirect costs (i.e.,
administrative expenses).  Travel expenses--primarily for scholars'
and teachers' travel--represent the next largest share of the
funding--about 20 percent.  The cost for scholar stipends; teacher
costs (i.e., payments for substitute teachers; participants'
honoraria, and site coordinator stipends); and other costs make up
the remaining 33 percent. 

   Figure 1:  Planned Expenditures
   for the Delta Teachers Academy,
   Fiscal Year 1995

   (See figure in printed
   edition.)

Source:  GAO's analysis of data from the National Faculty. 


--------------------
\5 USDA typically retains between 4 and 8 percent of a program's
funding to cover administrative costs. 


   PARTICIPANTS VIEW THE ACADEMY
   AS EFFECTIVE
------------------------------------------------------------ Letter :5

To evaluate the Academy's effectiveness, the National Faculty
administers evaluations to teacher participants following each
training session.  The organization began administering these
evaluations at the program's inception in 1992.  In February 1995,
the National Faculty contracted with Westat, Inc.,\6 to analyze more
than 1,000 evaluations from the 1994 Academy training sessions. 
Westat's resulting March 1995 report, Assessment of the National
Faculty's 1994 Delta Teachers Academy, concluded that although the
evaluation was limited in scope, its "results offer impressive
evidence that the FY 1994 Academy is having a positive impact on the
participating teachers."

In these evaluations, participants responded to questions relating to
the effectiveness of both the session and the scholar leading it. 
Teachers used the following 4-point scale to rate the extent to which
they agreed or disagreed with the given statement:  1 = strongly
disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = agree, and 4 = strongly agree.  According
to Westat's report, the mean responses ranged from 3.4 to 3.8 for
statements indicating that the program accomplished the following for
participants: 

  increased their understanding of a subject area,

  resulted in new ideas for changing classroom teaching,

  met their goals and expectations,

  increased their enthusiasm for teaching,

  broadened their perspective,

  reinforced their sense of professionalism, and

  paired them with scholars who were effective teachers. 

Appendix III provides the 1994 mean participant evaluation scores for
65 academic sessions and 10 summer institutes.\7

In addition to reviewing Westat's report, we conducted a telephone
survey of 11 randomly selected participants to obtain their views on
the Academy's effectiveness, both in comparison with that of other
teacher development programs and in the enhancement of their teaching
and professional skills.  Our survey included teachers from six of
the seven Delta states.  (See app.  I for our methodology.) Once
again, respondents' reactions to the Academy were positive.  On
average, participants responded that the Academy

  was more effective than any other teacher development program they
     had participated in,

  was very effective in renewing or enhancing knowledge in one or
     more academic subjects, and

  was generally effective in enhancing the teaching skills and
     strategies required for teaching challenging academic content. 

All 11 teachers listed a number of advantages the Academy had over
other programs, with 5 of the 11 also listing disadvantages.  The
most frequently cited advantages were the scholars' expertise and the
ideas and perspectives they brought in from around the country (cited
nine times) and the intensity and/or continuity of the program (cited
nine times).  The most frequently mentioned disadvantage (cited
twice) was that the Academy was less likely to be aimed at the
specific grade level taught by the participant. 

In addition, 9 out of 10 teachers\8 said that the program resulted in
changes in their curriculums or practice.  For example, five teachers
said that they had increased their use of hands-on exercises--e.g.,
using objects that can be manipulated to demonstrate mathematical
concepts--as a result of the Academy.  In another instance, a
Mississippi teacher taught her class how to analyze the content of
television and other media to determine, for example, what messages
are being conveyed in commercials.  As a result of an Academy session
on literature, this teacher also eliminated from her curriculum
literature that could be viewed as demeaning to women and minorities. 
In another case, a Louisiana teacher stated that her high school did
not have a geography program prior to her participation in the
Academy.  However, because of the geography-related materials and
teaching ideas she received in the Academy, she was able to develop a
geography program for the school.  Her school now requires every
ninth grade student to take 1 year of geography.  Once a week, the
students have an atlas day, when they plot imaginative "road rallies"
or use a series of clues to spot map locations. 


--------------------
\6 Westat, Inc., provides survey research and evaluation services. 

\7 According to a National Faculty official, although 95 sessions
were held in 1994, only 65 were evaluated.  Team coordinators did not
collect evaluations for 10 sessions, and 20 sessions were excluded
because participants in those sessions had begun training in 1992 or
1993--pilot years that were not included in the evaluation. 

\8 One teacher did not answer this question. 


   MORE COMPREHENSIVE EVALUATIONS
   PLANNED
------------------------------------------------------------ Letter :6

The National Faculty has not yet evaluated the impact of the Academy
on participants' teaching practices.  However, it is undertaking two
additional evaluations of the program's impact and effectiveness. 
For the first evaluation, Westat, Inc.  is surveying 90 teacher
participants to address such issues as the Academy's perceived impact
on teachers' (1) changing their curriculums or practices and (2)
assuming leadership roles in curriculum development or other
activities.  This evaluation is scheduled to be completed by early
summer 1995. 

For the second evaluation, the National Faculty is working with
Westat, Inc.  to plan a more comprehensive evaluation of all Faculty
programs.  This evaluation will assess, in greater depth, the
questions addressed in the first evaluation and other items, such as
the Faculty's selection and preparation of scholars.  Westat, Inc. 
is proposing that this evaluation include visits to participants'
classrooms to determine the Academy's impact on the participants'
teaching practices.  The evaluation is scheduled to be conducted in
fiscal year 1996. 

The National Faculty does not plan to measure the Academy's impact on
student achievement.  According to Westat, Inc.  evaluation experts,
it is difficult to demonstrate that changes in student achievement
result from one particular teacher development activity because many
factors affect student achievement.  This difficulty is compounded by
the fact that no more than a few teachers from any single school
typically participate in the Academy.\9 In addition, since 1994 was
the first nonpilot year, it is too early to measure the Academy's
long-term impact on teachers' performance. 


--------------------
\9 Our previous report, Precollege Math and Science Education: 
Department of Energy's Precollege Program Managed Ineffectively
(GAO/HEHS-94-208, Sept.  13, 1994), noted that research in the area
of teacher enhancement and its impact on student achievement has been
limited. 


   AGENCY COMMENTS
------------------------------------------------------------ Letter :7

In commenting on a draft of this report, the president of the
National Faculty stated that our account of the Academy and its
current status is accurate and fair.  (See app.  V.)


---------------------------------------------------------- Letter :7.1

We performed our work between March and June 1995 in accordance with
generally accepted government auditing standards.  Our scope and
methodology are discussed in appendix I. 

We are sending copies of this report to the appropriate congressional
committees, the Secretary of Agriculture, the National Faculty, and
other interested parties.  Copies will also be made available to
others upon request.  Please contact me at (202) 512-5138 if you or
your staff have any questions.  Major contributors to this report are
listed in appendix VI. 

John W.  Harman
Director, Food and
 Agriculture Issues


List of Requesters

The Honorable Mark O.  Hatfield
Chairman
The Honorable Robert C.  Byrd
Ranking Minority Member
Committee on Appropriations
United States Senate

The Honorable Thad Cochran
Chairman
The Honorable Dale L.  Bumpers
Ranking Minority Member
Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development,
 and Related Agencies
Committee on Appropriations United States Senate

The Honorable Bob Livingston
Chairman
The Honorable David R.  Obey
Ranking Minority Member
Committee on Appropriations
House of Representatives

The Honorable Joe Skeen
Chairman
The Honorable Richard J.  Durbin
Ranking Minority Member
Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development,
Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies
Committee on Appropriations
House of Representatives


SCOPE AND METHODOLOGY
=========================================================== Appendix I

To obtain background information on the Delta Teachers Academy, we
interviewed officials and reviewed reports and documents and from the
U.S.  Department of Agriculture's Office of Inspector General and the
Cooperative State Research and Education Extension Service; the
Department of Education's Office of Educational Research and
Improvement; the National Education Goals Panel; state departments of
education in Mississippi, Louisiana, and Illinois; Mississippi State
University's National Center for Technology Planning; Michigan State
University's National Center for Research on Teacher Learning; and
the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Training. 

To describe the Academy program, we reviewed the National Faculty's
grant applications, plans, budgets, status reports, schedules,
participant workbooks, and institute agendas and interviewed the
National Faculty officials. 

To obtain the views of Academy participants: 

  We reviewed summary statistics provided to us by Westat, Inc., for
     the 1994 training session evaluations from teachers who began
     participating in the Academy in 1994.  The evaluations were
     completed by 292 (100 percent) of these participants in the 1994
     summer institutes and 842 (84 percent) of the 1,003 participants
     in the 2-day sessions. 

  We surveyed 11 teacher participants by telephone.  The National
     Faculty provided a list of 344 teachers who participated in the
     Academy in 1994.  From this list, we randomly selected 35
     participants to survey.  After three attempts to contact each of
     the 35 participants, 11 participants responded.  These
     participants came from six of the seven Delta states and had
     attended both a summer institute and an academic session. 

  In addition, we judgmentally selected and interviewed by telephone
     three teachers.  These teachers were selected from a list of 25
     teachers identified by the Faculty as teachers who had
     introduced substantive changes into their classrooms as a result
     of participating in the Academy program. 

To understand the issues involved in evaluating the Academy program,
we reviewed Westat's proposals for its (1) survey of 90 teacher
participants and (2) in-depth evaluation of Faculty programs and
discussed evaluation issues with Westat officials. 

We did not evaluate the impact of the program on the participants'
students because of the methodological difficulties involved in such
evaluations.  We also did not verify the number of participants and
sessions provided by the National Faculty. 


CHILDREN LIVING IN POVERTY, 1990
========================================================== Appendix II



   (See figure in printed
   edition.)

   Source:  GAO's analysis of data
   from the Bureau of the Census.

   (See figure in printed
   edition.)


MEAN SCORES OF TEACHER EVALUATIONS
FOR 1994 SUMMER INSTITUTES AND
ACADEMIC SESSIONS
========================================================= Appendix III

Tables III.1 and III.2 show the mean scores, by question, on the
evaluations completed by teachers who began participating in the
Academy in 1994.  The total number of evaluations completed was
1,134; 842 were for academic sessions, and 292 were for summer
institutes.  The response categories for the evaluations were the
following:  1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = agree, and 4 =
strongly agree. 



                         Table III.1
           
           1994 Academic Session Evaluation Results

Evaluation statement                                    Mean
--------------------------------------------------  --------
Impacts on the teacher
------------------------------------------------------------
My understanding of my subject area has increased       3.46
My enthusiasm for teaching has increased                3.41
I have already thought of ways to change my             3.43
 classroom teaching as a result of this session