The Federal Administration of Evaluation Program Improvement and Technical Assistance under ECIA Chapter 1.

This document examines the following aspects of the federal administration of evaluation, program improvement, and technical assistance under Chapter 1 of the Education Consolidation and Improvement Act: (1) changes in each of the three areas since 1981 when Chapter 1 replaced Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act; (2) activities currently conducted in the United States Department of Education (ED) in each area; and (3) problems and opportunities experienced in the federal administration of evaluation, program improvement, and technical assistance. Among the conclusions are the following: (1) ED has encouraged state and local educational agencies (SEAs and LEAs) to continue collecting data on project effectiveness and participant characteristics using the evaluation system mandated under Title I; (2) reports of errors in the research design, collection, and reporting of achievement data suggest that ED should assess the quality of those data to determine if changes are needed; (3) problems in the federal administration of the improvement initiative arise from the voluntary nature of state and local activities to improve Chapter 1 quality, that is not the SEAs' central purpose; and (4) Technical Assistance Center performance in assisting SEAs and LEAs in program improvement has been limited by constraints on their resources, low levels of interest, and the structure of the Chapter 1 program. Data are presented on three tables; a list of references is included. (BJV)