Centre de recherche sur les services éducatifs et communautairesCRSEC.uOttawa.ca

Centre for Research on Educational and Community Services CRECS.uOttawa.ca

Vanier room 5002136 Jean Jacques LussierOttawa, OntarioK1N 6N5

► An Evaluation of the C&CS

► Maama Watali: Program Evaluation Students in the Field

► E=MC2 Project where Engagement = Mobilizing Communities and Collaboration

► Are Franco-Ontarian educators more likely to feel stressed than their Anglo-Ontarian counterparts?

► CRECS Knowledge Mobilization

► CRECS Relationship with IPDET Taken to a New Level

► Residential and Foster Care for Children and Adolescents

► The Odyssey Project ► Evaluation of

Homelessness Action Plans (HAPs) in Ottawa, Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver

► 24th Annual Edward F. Kelly Evaluation Conference

► Tutoring Can Help Foster Children to Improve Their Reading and Math Skills

► Challenging and Exciting Co-op Semester

► Hiring a CO-OP student pays off!

► EventsLearning what works in improving high school students’ access to PSE Franco-Ontarian Teenagers’ Stress and Sociolinguistic Vitality

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From the Director,

Greetings. Well, 2013 is upon us and with the start of a brand new year I am delight-ed to share some recent developments and future directions at CRECS. Under the direction of CRECS’ Coordinator Alejandro Gomez we are now located at our new quarters in the refurbished Vanier Hall, immediately adjacent to the new Social Sciences building. For the first time since the Centre’s inception we are located in a venue that allows for our students, profes-sors and research and administrative staff to be under the same roof. In the short time that we have been together, there are already many signs of collaboration and cross-fertilization which, really, is very much part of what CRECS is all about.

We are now regularly hiring a co-op stu-dent in each semester of the year and I would like to take this opportunity to thank Julie Ma (International Development) for all of her hard work and accomplishments in her short time with us in the fall 2012 term. I would also like to extend a warm welcome to Samantha Lapointe (An-thropology) who will be with us through to April.

We are currently finishing up some modi-fications to our office space and some of that includes new and exciting technologi-cal upgrades that will no doubt assist us with our knowledge mobilization interests. When we are done we plan to host an open house, so please do drop by to see us then, if not beforehand!

Once again I would like to thank Alejandro for his excellent work on compiling another great issue of Impact. As is usually the case, you will find this issue packed with lots of interesting reports and reflections on some of our many projects and activi-ties.

Sincerely | Sincèrement!

Brad Cousins

Hivers | Printemps

2013

Parrainé par Sponsored by

Faculté d`éducationFaculty of Education

Faculté des sciences socialesFaculty of Social Sciences

Mot du directeur,

Salutations à tous. En ce début d’année 2013 déjà bien entamée, je suis très heureux de vous faire part de certains faits récents et des orienta-tions futures du CRSÉC.

Sous la direction d’Alejandro Gomez, coordon-nateur du CRSÉC, le Centre est désormais logé dans de nouveaux locaux du pavillon Vanier ré-nové depuis peu, juste à côté du nouveau pavil-lon des Sciences sociales. Pour la première fois depuis sa création, le Centre est situé dans un lieu qui permet aux étudiants, aux professeurs ainsi qu’au personnel affecté à la recherche et à l’administration de travailler sous un même toit. Depuis le peu de temps que nous cohabitons, nous avons déjà constaté plusieurs signes de collaboration et d’enrichissement mutuel ce qui, somme toute, est l’essence même du CRSÉC.

Chaque semestre, nous embauchons régu-lièrement un étudiant du programme Coop et je profite de l’occasion pour remercier Julie Ma (Développement international) pour son travail acharné et ses accomplissements pendant la courte période passée avec nous durant la ses-sion d’automne 2012. J’aimerais également sou-haiter la bienvenue à Samantha Lapointe (An-thropologie) qui sera avec nous jusqu’en avril.

Nous nous affairons actuellement à apporter quelques modifications à l’aménagement de nos bureaux, dont une mise à niveau technologique, nouvelle et passionnante, qui ne manquera pas de nous aider dans le domaine de la mobilisa-tion des connaissances. Lorsque nous aurons terminé ce projet, nous envisageons d’organiser une journée porte ouverte. Alors, passez nous voir à ce moment-là ou même avant.

Encore une fois, je tiens à remercier Alejandro pour son excellent travail dans la compilation d’articles pour le formidable numéro d’Impact. Comme c’est habituellement le cas, vous y trouverez de nombreux rapports et d’articles de réflexion intéressants sur un bon nombre de nos projets et activités.

impactIn this number

Winter | Spring

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An Evaluation of the C&CS Michael Kirk < michaelgkirk@gmail.com >

In the spring of 2012, a team of researchers – consist-ing of two graduate students from the Department of Criminology (Michael Kirk and Nicole LeBlanc) and one recent Program Evaluation Certificate graduate (Christine Riddick) – assembled by Dr. Ron Melchers, submitted to the Student Academic Success Service (SASS), an evaluation of the Counselling and Coach-ing Service (C&CS).

C&CS is designed to help students throughout their academic career to achieve personal, academic, and professional success. C&CS is offered through the University of Ottawa’s SASS.

C&CS offers services to graduate and undergradu-ate students including one-on-one counselling, ca-reer counselling and workshops, and counsellors in residence among others. C&CS also provides online resources for parents and professors to help identify students in need.

This formative evaluation explored if C&CS improves perseverance towards graduation and individual aca-demic success; if career counselling helps students identify/clarify their challenges, successful coaching strategies and career path; and the degree of profes-sor, student and university personnel exposure to C&CS.

Eight lines of evidence supported this evaluation. Data sources included student data from the Univer-sity’s Institutional Research and Planning; surveys of personal and career counselling clients, full and part-time professors (N=268), university personnel (program administrators and advisors), and a sample of University of Ottawa students; one key informant interview; and a focus group with counsellors.

This evaluation found that C&CS has limited success in achieving stated objectives. IPR data revealed that C&CS contributes to perseverance towards gradua-tion at the undergraduate level as a greater number of students who access C&CS completed their studies, but no difference was found at the graduate level.

C&CS contributes to individual success, a belief shared by focus group and key informant interview

participants. Self-report surveys of program partici-pants corroborated these feelings; students who regu-larly accessed personal counselling reported higher degrees of success in their personal, academic, and professional lives; this is particularly true for those who learned coping strategies. Despite such success, 44% of clients reported an inability to see a counsellor in what they considered a reasonable amount of time.

Where career counselling is concerned, students re-ported general satisfaction with this service. However, students were unsatisfied with the ability of C&CS to help clarify their career path and identifying suitable and desirable types of employment (this service has since been moved to Career Services). But, due to a limited sample size, this conclusion may be tenuous (N=24).

As program management suspected, awareness of C&CS across the university is lacking. The majority of professors and students surveyed, and nearly half of university personnel reported unawareness of C&CS. While C&CS offers a number of services, those who were aware of C&CS were largely only aware of one-on-one personal counselling.

Generally, researchers found C&CS is meeting stated objectives. However, C&CS suffers from a lack of vis-ibility, and a lack of resources which result in over-worked counsellors and the inability to provide servic-es as quickly as both program managers and clientele would desire. Consequently, it is recommended that C&CS continue and expand awareness efforts, the University ought to increase C&CS resources to meet demand, and other methods of program delivery be explored (ie online resources) to help meet this de-mand.

To date, C&CS is acting upon a few of these recom-mendations: C&CS is increasing student awareness by emailing students three strategic times per ses-sion; C&CS has hired more contract counsellors and extended hours of operation to meet increased de-mand; and an online video on how to manage exam anxiety is available on the website.

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Maama Watali: Program Evaluation Students in the Field Susan Namulindwa < snamulindwa@gmail.com > and Harriet Nannyonga < lindanannyonga@yahoo.com >

In 2007, following significant personal loss, Susan Namulindwa, created the Maama Watali residence in her home town of Luweero. Maama Watali, which in the Luganda language means “in the absence of a mother” provides services to vulnerable orphaned Ugandan women, aged 13 to 24. Maama Watali relies on peer-education and mentoring to foster healthy living and enhance employability through residential, edu-cational and micro-credit programs. It addresses the need to support young women transitioning from childhood to economically independent adulthood.

Devastated by civil war, with planned rape, child soldiers and systemic murder as common prac-tices, family structures have been torn apart. Hunger and poverty are widespread and a high proportion of the popula-tion is HIV positive. Over half the population is under the age of fifteen, a generation that has seen significant numbers of family members lost to war and disease. This has resulted in a young, frac-tured and disenfranchised demographic with complex needs, many of whom have never having experienced stability in family, security or health.

In January 2011, with the support of CRECS, Madeleine Anderson and Shalan Gobeil, two students enrolled in the Graduate Certificate in Program Evaluation travelled to Luweero to conduct a developmental evaluation. An official report was produced in May 2012.

The evaluation team arrival was timely because the organization was at a crossroads. The evaluation sought to: define aim, roles and responsibilities; determine programming needs and resources; and, clarify partner-ships.

More fundamental was the need for ongoing developmen-tal evaluation capacity. The overall goal was to improve program design, relevancy, and long-term stability.

What the team found was a resilient community dedicated to providing their youth a hopeful future. Without doubt Maama Watali provides a necessary service and the young women being supported in their transition are well

served. But, the program is not sustainable. The time, the energy and financial resources required to run Maama Watali are being provided by a small group of volunteers, all feeling stretched and overwhelmed by the everyday needs of Luweero.

Based on their report, the Evaluation Team highlight-ed ways to build internal evaluation capacity and create an external support-ing network of interested professionals drawn from a variety of sources. Maama Watali could be a logical partner with the University of Ottawa through CRECS. Both would mutually benefit from an opportunity to:

• Conduct research on peo-ple at the socio-economic

margins of a low income country;

• Build internal evaluation capacity within the organiza-tion;

• Share knowledge and expertise in organizational man-agement and transitional youth;

• Contribute to policy formulation;

• Replicate knowledge gained in other post-conflict areas.

The recommendations in the evaluation report are de-signed to strengthen existing services. It is hoped, with the support of partners such as the University of Ottawa, Maama Watali will continue to infuse evaluative thinking into their programs and to provide residents with a warm and family environment “in the absence of a mother”.

Information on Maama Watali can be found at :

www.maamawatali.org

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E=MC2 Project where Engagement = Mobilizing Communities and CollaborationCeline Pinsent < celine.pinsent@uOttawa.ca >

CRECS researchers have engaged in a research project designed to put existing data and knowledge on volunteer-ing, giving and participation to good use! Having received funding from Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC) and the Faculty of Social Sciences, the E=MC2 Project Team over the next four years will be exam-ining various sources of information and data on volunteer-ing, donating and participating in Canada, while working with stakeholders and communities to mobilize this knowledge into practical, useful tools and initiatives that can be used by communities to potentially increase levels of community engagement.

With the overall aim to help caring Canadians build stronger communities, the three broad questions that will guide the E=MC2 project are:

• What do we need to know? What are the main chal-lenges and information gaps identified by key Canadian organizations and sectors with respect to increasing the rates of volunteering and giving in Canada?

• What do we know? What do data available from the Canadian Survey on Giving Volunteering and Participat-ing along with other data sources offer to assist and/or contribute to addressing these challenges and gaps?

• What can we do with what we know? How can the find-ings from analyses of these data sets be integrated into ongoing and innovative sector activities to contribute to increased contribution and engagement of citizens through giving and volunteering in their communities?

Each broad question provides the overall structure for the project in terms of objectives, sub-objectives, activities and measured outcomes and impacts.

The overall approach includes two defining characteristics:

Stakeholder Mobilization and Knowledge Mobilization: two streams to be integrated at key points.

By concentrating on these two streams and having the tasks weave through both streams at key stages during the project, we anticipate that the project will be able to demonstrate positive impacts by mobilizing not only knowledge and key information but also the targeted stake-holders. Sector consultations will identify key challenges and gaps and knowledge dissemination considerations.

Development of a National Project Advisory Committee, Targeted Working Groups, and Demonstration Communi-ties – We are developing a structure at the outset of the project to provide overall direction and guidance to the Project Team, as well as provide opportunities to implement and evaluate key initiatives and tools at the local level. Inte-gral to the project are the development and implementation of a partnering strategy, as well as an ongoing communica-tion strategy.

The E=MC2 Project is a good example of the multi-disci-plinarily, partnering and collaboration involved in CRECS projects with the direct involvement of 5 CRECS Senior and Affiliate researchers, many graduate and undergraduate students, multiple research and service centres on campus, and various partners from the government, private, and not-for-profit sectors.

The project is being led by Louise Lemyre (Principal Inves-tigator) and Elizabeth Kristjansson (Co-Principal Investiga-tor) with co-investigators including Caroline Andrew, Brad Cousins, John Sylvestre, and Stephane Cardinal.

For more information please contact the Project Director, Celine Pinsent (celine.pinsent@uottawa.ca)

Picture, Stéphane Cardinal, John Sylvestre, Celine Pinsent, Louise Lemyre, Brad Cousins, Betsy Kristjansson, Paul Boutette, Caroline Andrew, Alexandra Guay-Charrette, An Gie Yong, Sean Pearce, Alejandro GomezAbsent: Kate Svensson, Andrea Dixon, Lu Lu

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Stress in the workplace has become the new buzz word whether it is in the public service, private sector or in the classroom. I have been looking at negative forms of psychological stress in education ever since I began my doctoral thesis in 1998.

I initially looked at the relationship between future teachers’ stress and social problem solving skills. In fact, I found a relationship between these two concepts in 458 future teachers (also known as student teachers) at Laval University in that the more one is stressed the less one is able to solve social problems. This led me to investigate further and look at the link between three core concepts: stress, coping and burnout.

My first step was to examine the literature and do a meta-analysis on future teacher and teacher stress which was published in the Canadian Journal of Education in 2005. I then administered a questionnaire pertaining to the three core concepts (stress, coping, burnout) of what I consider to be the stress cycle. I wanted to focus my research on Francophone minority populations in Ontario because they are a linguistic minority and may have the added stress of trying to preserve their language and culture. However, this hypothesis has never been tested. With this in mind, I administered the questionnaire to Francophone future teachers at the University of Ottawa and Laurentian University in Sudbury and did the same for Francophone university professors at the same institutions. The results proved that there is an inextricable link between stress, coping and burnout in both Francophone student teachers and university professors. However, I was not able to clearly prove that Francophone university professors and students teachers were more stressed than their Anglophone counterparts. Lessons learned! Yet, there are always time and budget constraints and one may never forget that research is cumulative; hence I am presently pursuing this link in Francophone and Anglophone adolescents.

I just completed a literature review and analysis of Adolescent stress and coping because my present research project explores whether Francophone adolescents are more stressed than their Anglophone counterparts. This time, the criteria – stress, coping and sociolinguistic vitality – is slightly different and I will administer the questionnaire to both groups of Adolescents (Francophones and Anglophones). This last concept (sociolinguistic vitality) is linked with identity and means how Anglophone or Francophone one feels. This time around I want to directly verify the hypothesis that Ontarian Francophones are more psychologically stressed than Anglophone Ontarians by comparing the two groups. I would even like to go deeper and do a

national study looking at Francophone and Anglophone (e.g. in Quebec) minorities across the country. This would be helpful for parents, school boards and policy decision makers giving them a potentially broader understanding of linguistic minorities’ needs and challenges.

Looking ahead to the future, following this research project my plan is to look at teaching style, stress, coping and burnout internationally. This relationship is intriguing because of the recent shifts

in education towards modern “constructivist” teaching methods that are often preached yet not practiced. It is my own personal observation as well as that of two authors of a recently published book on stress in education (Janot-Beregugnat and Rascle, 2008) that educators still cling to the traditional approach thereby generating more psychological stress compared to those trying to use the more modern constructivist student-centered discovery based teaching methods sometimes named explicit teaching. Both groups of educators are stressed but the nature of their stressors is unique to their teaching style. At least, I think this may be the case...

Stay tuned!

Are Franco-Ontarian educators more likely to feel stressed than their Anglo-Ontarian counterparts?Cameron Montgomery < cmontgom@uOttawa.ca >

The recent shifts in education towards

modern “constructivist” teach-

ing methods that are often preached yet not practiced.

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Four-year Indian Education Capacity Building Project Comes To An End Brad Cousins <bcousins@uOttawa.ca>

CRECS Relationship with IPDET Taken to a New Level Brad Cousins <bcousins@uottawa.ca> CRECS has a long standing relationship with the Inter-national Program for Development Evaluation Training (IPDET) an annual capacity building program offered each year in Ottawa and co-sponsored by the World Bank and Carleton University. In 2003 Brad Cousins developed and validated an achievement test to be used for evaluating the program and starting 2004 became the external evaluator of IPDET’s annual program. That responsibility was taken over by David Trumpower, Senior Researcher, Faculty of Education in 2008, who has served as external evaluator for each of the past five years.

In 2010, Cousins and Catherine Elliott carried out an im-pact evaluation of IPDET which feature an on-line survey of alumni and site visits to three country-level (China, Botswa-na, Sri Lanka) and 2 organizational-level (Geneva, Ottawa) case sites.

In December 2012, Brad Cousins participated in the delivery of Shanghai IPDET or SHIPDET, a version of the two-week IPDET core training program compressed into eight (8) days of training. Along with Dr. Linda Imas-Morra, Cousins delivered the training in Shanghai to a group of forty (40) participants from about fifteen (15) countries

in the eastern Asian region. Half of the participants were Russian speaking, com-ing from several states that were formerly part of the Soviet Union (simultaneous translation was used). SHIPDET was originally founded in 2007 by the Ministry of Finance, People’s Republic of China, in partnership with the Asian Development Bank and is managed by the Asian-Pacific Finance Development Centre. It is offered each spring to Chinese nationals and each fall to international participants from the region.

Whether at home or abroad, CRECS looks forward to continuing to support IPDET in meeting its needs.

An end-of-project conference was held in New Delhi in September 2012 marking the culmination of a massive capacity building initiative in the Indian education sector. The event was sponsored by the National Council of Educational Research and Training in collaboration with the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan-Technical Cooperation Fund-Technical Services Agency. The project, funded by a consortium of donor agencies spearheaded but the UK’s Department of Foreign and International Development (DFID), consisted of two principal streams of development: Assessment of Learning and Programme Evaluation associated with educational reform in the elementary ed-ucation panel. CRECS played a central leadership role on the programme evaluation capacity building strand.

Over the four year period CRECS developed and deliv-ered eight (8) centralized workshops in India (mostly in New Delhi but also in Dharmshala and Mysor); hosted two (2) study tours of Indian colleagues to North Ameri-ca and provided consultation and guidance for eight (8) Indian-led large scale evaluations in two (2) cycles of training. The approach to training was unique in that it integrated elements of participatory development and evaluation, bridged cultural contexts, and centered on theory informed practice. Several CRECS senior and affiliate researchers participated directly in the project, including: Brad Cousins, Jill Chouinard, Marielle Simon, and Catherine Elliott.

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Residential and Foster Care for Children and Adolescents Joel Beaupre < transitions@uOttawa.ca >

This fall, some staff from the Centre for Research on Educational and Community Services (CRECS) had the chance to attend the 12th annual European Scientific Association conference on Residential Foster Care for Children and Adolescents (EUSARF). EUSARF is one of the important conferences pertaining to child welfare. This year the conference was taking place in Glasgow in the United Kingdom.

Several staff members from CRECS had the opportunity to attend and also to give a presentation at this conference. This experience was enriching and positive and I am very grateful I was able to be there. My presentation was twofold. In the first part; I presented an exhaustive Canadian literature review of research conducted in the field of transitions from or within child welfare services. In the second part I presented a new longitudinal study that has been in progress for a few months. The study that was presented concerned transitions of crown wards from or within child welfare services in four eastern Ontario children aid societies.

In the first part of the presentation it was assessed that much more research in this field is needed to better understand the realities of these children by these children. The literature review made the point about the necessity for more research on this subject in Canada.

In the second part of the presentation a new research project being carried out by Professor Robert Flynn and colleagues at the CRECS was presented. This longitudinal study will possibly be the largest of its

kind on the subject of transitions from child welfare in Canada. The research called Transitions of Crown Wards in Child Welfare is being conducted with the collaboration of four Children Aid Societies from eastern Ontario and we are grateful for their devotion and involvement in the project.

During the time spent in Glasgow, it was also possible to attend the International Research Network on Transitions to Adulthood from Care (INTRAC) annual conference. The INTRAC group is composed of 25 members in 16 different

countries where Canada is represented by Professor Robert Flynn from the CRECS. The conference allowed networking with some of the most prominent researchers in the field of transitions to adulthood from child welfare, as well as their students. The members of the INTRAC group that where present welcomed warmly Robert Flynn’s and colleagues’ new research that is being carried out by the CRECS and the four partner agencies. Possible future collaborations were discussed with different members.

Altogether the EUSARF and INTRAC conferences were great instances to present the Transitions of Crown Wards in Child Welfare study to different audiences who were eager to learn about the progress in this field of research in Canada.

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Research Goal and ObjectivesThe Arts Education Consortium is a loose-ly-coupled partnership of arts organizations and cultural institu-tions in the national capital region which was organized to support teacher development and research in arts education. A program evaluation study, entitled, “the Odyssey Project”, was initiated by the Consortium and funded by the Laidlaw Foundation to assess the effectiveness of its partnership with the University of Ottawa’s professional development courses for en-hancing teachers’ arts learning and developing their instructional effectiveness. The partnership and evalu-ation research involved the participation of artists in the delivery of A.Q. and M.Ed. arts courses in collaboration with the instructors over a ten-year period.

Research Project ActivitiesEach summer teachers who enrolled in the Integrated A. Q. and M.Ed. Teaching and Learning in the Arts undertook their courses on-site at Canada’s cultural in-stitutions - the National Arts Centre, National Gallery of Canada, and the Canadian Museum of Civilization. The courses featured the involvement of professional artists in collaboration with the course instructors. The number of students ranged from fifteen to thirty in each course on a yearly basis. Funding for the artists and use of the facilities without cost to the program were donated by the Arts Education Consortium. At the conclusion of the

course each year, the artists, teachers and/or instruc-tors were invited to participate in a program evaluation study.

MethodologyThe study utilized Integrated Inquiry in each phase of study. This is a multiple measures methodology employing research protocols which are designed, analyzed and interpreted in relation to each other. The protocols may be multiple qualitative and/or quantita-tive instruments and may be implemented over ex-tended time periods. In the 7 phases of The Odyssey Project a broad range of protocols were implemented for the program evaluation: surveys, questionnaires, focus groups, interviews, reflective journals, impact statements, and visioning exercises.

Research Outcomes to DateTo date, a research report has been produced for each of the seven phases of The Odyssey Project. Further, the reports have been expanded into re-search articles for refereed journals (3 are published; 1 is under review; and 3 are in-progress). The evalu-ation research demonstrates that artist involvement in professional development courses for teachers can substantially improve their arts expertise and increase their willingness to teach the arts in their own class-rooms.

The Odyssey ProjectBernie Andrews < b.w.andrews@uOttawa.ca >

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review; (2) an analysis of changes in population level indicators since the adoption of HAPs; and, (3) semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders involved in the development and implementation of HAPs in each of the four cities.

The evaluation expects to make a contribution to knowledge and policy by delivering the following: (1) four municipal case studies, as well as a cross-case comparative analysis, that evaluate the degree to which HAPs have been successfully implemented, including comprehensive, locally relevant information that can be used to inform action on housing afford-ability and homelessness in each city; and, (2) a conceptual model of how HAPs impact homelessness and improve health equity outcomes in Canadian communities.

New knowledge from this study is expected to inform potential best practices that can be used and adapted by communities in the development of action plans and to provide a set of rigorous evaluation methods that can be applied to the evaluation of HAPs in other municipalities.

The Ottawa component of the PHIR study is led by Tim Aubry (CRECS, University of Ottawa), Susan Farrell (University of Ottawa), and Fran Klodawsky (Carleton University). The National Coordinator for the study is Abra Adamo, currently housed at CRECS.

The CRECS is involved in a new qualitative study entitled Population Health Interventions to End Homelessness (PHIR), undertaken by the Research Alliance for Canadian Homelessness, Housing, and Health (REACH3) and funded by the Canadian Insti-tutes for Health Research (CIHR). The 2-year study, which commenced in October 2012, involves an important and innovative evaluation of Homelessness Action Plans (HAPs) in four Canadian cities: Ottawa, Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver. HAPs are sets of policies and programs, usually developed at the municipal or provincial level, with the stated goal of ending or reducing homelessness. To date, however, HAPs in Canada have not been systematically evalu-ated. The objectives of the study are: (1) to determine the degree to which HAPs achieve success, where success is defined as implementation of the HAP’s proposed policies and programs; (2) to identify the barriers and facilitators associated with the success of HAPs; (3) to assess the magnitude of changes over time in population-level indicators of homelessness and affordable housing that take place before and during periods that HAPs have been implemented; and (4) to develop a conceptual model of the factors that determine whether a HAP will be successful in improving housing and health outcomes at the popu-lation level. The evaluation methodology involves data collected from: (1) a comprehensive document

Evaluation of Homelessness Action Plans (HAPs) in Ottawa, Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver Abra Adamo < abra.adamo@uOttawa.ca >

ence proceedings. We are pleased to announce that the keynote address will be given by Dr. Rodney K. Hopson, the president of the American Evaluation Society.

For students interested in presenting their research, please note that abstracts must be submitted by Febru-ary 8, midnight, Eastern Standard Time. Please visit https://sites.google.com/site/24thkellyconference/home for further information on submission procedures and full agenda. For any other inquiries or to volunteer, please write to the organizing team at kellyconfer-ence2013@uottawa.ca

We look forward to seeing you there!

This April, the Centre for Research on Educational and Community Services (CRECS) will sponsor the 24th Annual Edward F. Kelly Evaluation Conference, held this year at University of Ottawa. The goal of this graduate student-led event is to provide students in the field of evaluation with an opportunity to network with other students, professionals and faculty in the field, and to present original research. To support this event’s twofold objective, a social evening will be held on Thursday, April 11th, followed by the full-day con-ference on April 12th.

The conference welcomes research from any disci-pline associated with evaluation theory or practice (e.g. innovative methodologies, research on evalua-tion, conceptual issues, etc.). Beyond this opportunity, presenters will also publish their papers in the confer-

24th Annual Edward F. Kelly Evaluation Conference Kate Svensson < @uOttawa.ca >

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Tutoring Can Help Foster Children to Improve Their Reading and Math Skills Robert J. Flynn <rflynn@uOttawa.ca> and Robyn A. Marquis

Research in numerous countries, including Canada, indicates that many young people residing in out-of-home care need to improve their educational perfor-mance (Flynn, Ghazal, Legault, Vandermeulen, & Pet-rick, 2004; Jackson, 2007; Trout, Hagaman, Casey, Reid, & Epstein, 2008). Many lag a year or two be-hind their age peers in the general population (Trout et al., 2008) because of abuse or neglect suffered be-fore coming into care as well as to disruptive changes in placements or schools while in care. As a result, young people in care are less likely to obtain a high school diploma or enrol in post-secondary education (Pecora et al., 2010).

The few published Canadian studies on the education-al attainment of children and adolescents in care have found results similar to those in the international litera-ture. Flynn and Biro (1998) reported that young people in care in Ontario had higher rates of grade retention and school suspension than their age peers in the gen-eral population. In the Ontario Looking After Children (OnLAC) project, Flynn et al. (2004) compared two groups of looked-after young people, aged 5 to 9 and 10 to 15 years, respectively, with nationally representa-tive samples of the same age from the general Canadi-an population. Eighty percent of the looked-after older children and 78% of the younger children were rated by their foster parents as performing educationally in the same range as the lowest third of the respective comparison groups from the general population (who had been rated by their parents on reading, spelling, math, and overall educational performance).

Tutoring is the best-validated intervention for helping young people in care to improve their skills in read-ing or math (Forsman & Vinnerljung, 2012). Thus, we conducted a randomized controlled trial (RCT) that ad-dressed two key questions. First, would foster children

of primary-school age who received individualized direct-instruction tutoring (Maloney, 1998) from their foster parents experience significantly greater pre-test to post-test gains in reading and math than foster chil-dren in a wait-list control group? Second, would girls and boys in foster care benefit about equally from the tutoring? The research sample consisted of 77 foster children in 9 local Children’s Aid Societies in Ontario, Canada, aged 6 to 13 years and in primary-school grades 2 to 7. The 64 foster children who completed the 30-week tutoring intervention and both the pre-test and post-test, 30 in the tutoring group and 34 in the wait-list control group (the latter received the tutor-ing intervention later) comprised the analysis sample. The Wide Range Achievement Test—Fourth edition (WRAT4; Wilkinson & Robertson, 2006) was the out-come measure.

At the end (post-test)of the study, the foster children who had received tutoring had made statistically and practically greater gains than those in the control group on the WRAT4 sub-tests of Sentence Comprehension, Reading Composite, and Math Computation, although not on Word Reading or Spelling. Also, both the girls and the boys in the tutoring group experienced average gains in reading and math that were greater than those of the children in the control group. The girls made their strongest gains on Math Computation, while the boys did so on Sentence Comprehension. Our find-ings have now been repeated and extended in a simi-lar RCT conducted with a sample of mainly Aboriginal children in care in Thunder Bay, Ontario (Harper, 2012; Harper & Schmidt, 2012). Overall, these results indi-cate that direct-instruction tutoring can be used with many children in out of home care to help them im-prove their educational achievement.

Contact Robert Flynn for more info, or check these out!Flynn, R. J., & Biro, C. (1998). Comparing developmental outcomes for children in care with those of other children in Canada. Children and Society, 12, 228-233.Flynn, R. J., Ghazal, H., Legault, L., Vandermeulen, G., & Petrick, S. (2004). Use of population measures and norms to identify resilient outcomes in young people in care: An exploratory study. Child and Family Social Work, 9, 65-79.Flynn, R. J., Marquis, R. A., Paquet, M. P., Peeke, L. M., & Aubry, T. (2012). Effects of individual direct-instruction tutoring on foster children’s academic skills: A randomized trial. Chil dren and Youth Services Review, 34, 1183-1189.Forsman, H., & Vinnerljung, B. (2012). Interventions aiming to improve school achievements of children in out-of-home care: A scoping review. Children and Youth Services Review, 34, 1084-1091. Harper, J. M. (2012). Effectiveness of a group-based tutorial direct instruction program for long-term foster-care children: A randomized controlled trial. Thunder Bay, ON: Unpublished doctoral thesis, Department of Psychology, Lakehead University. Harper, J., & Schmidt, F. (2012). Preliminary effects of a group-based tutoring program for children in long-term foster care. Children and Youth Services Review, 34, 1176-1182.Jackson, S. (2007). Progress at last? Adoption and Fostering, 31(1), 3-5.Maloney, M. (1998). Teach your children well: A solution to some of North America’s educational problems. Belleville, ON: QLC Educational Services.Pecora, P. J., Kessler, R. C., Williams, J., Downs, A. C., English, D. J., White, J., & O’Brien, K. (2010). What works in foster care? Key components of success from the Northwest Foster Care Alumni Study. New York: Oxford University Press. Trout, A .L., Hagaman, J., Casey, K., Reid, R., & Epstein, M. H. (2008). The academic status of children and youth in out-of-home care: A review of the literature. Children and Youth

Services Review, 30, 979-994.Wilkinson, G. S., & Robertson, G. J. (2006). Wide-Range Achievement Test—Fourth edition. Lutz, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources.

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From September to December 2012, I had the opportunity to work at the Centre for Research on Educational and Commu-nity Services (CRECS) under the University of Ottawa’s Co-operative Program. Throughout my placement, I learned how research, evaluation and training improved social programs; and I both learned and contributed to

creating a strategic plan of integrating information and communication technologies for CRECS. Specifically, I worked on updating and creating a more user-friend-ly website; meeting and event planning; daily admin-istrative tasks and project co-ordination; and creative projects such as podcasts, photography, brochures, and online surveys.

I worked directly with the Coordinator of CRECS, Alejandro Gomez, on a day-to-day basis. Alejandro personally took the time to mentor and train me, using his vast knowledge on artificial intelligence, computer software programs, media outlets, photography, and technology. Alejandro was able to open my creative mind and stretch the possibilities of new and more efficient technologies. Alejandro made sure I was always a part of the team and challenged me to think more creatively and outside the box. He took my strengths and made them stronger, and he took my weaknesses and challenged me to overcome them and turn them into strengths. Without a doubt, his expertise in this field will continually help me grow and prosper in my future endeavors. My passion for com-munications technology grew considerably during my placement and CRECS allowed me to implement my

ideas into practice.

Another opportunity that I had while working with CRECS was to work closely with University of Ottawa Professors and Graduate students. Being a fourth year in my Undergraduate Degree of International Development and Globalization, I have not had the chance to make personal connections with my Pro-fessors thus far. Working with CRECS allowed this possibility to become a reality. I was able to meet and form connections with Professors in both the Faculty of Social Sciences and the Faculty of Educa-tion. Working with both the Professors and Graduate students on a daily basis allowed me to gain insight on possible career and academic options that I never knew were available to me before. Specifically, I have a new found interest in Program Evaluation. The Di-rector of CRECS, Professor Brad Cousins, introduced the topic to me and spoke to me about the need for people in the field of Development Evaluation. This is an idea that will be integrated into my future career choice and I have both CRECS and the University of Ottawa’s Co-operative Program to thank.

There were numerous benefits of working for CRECS and my experience here has been nothing short of ex-ceptional. I will be sure to take everything I learned working at CRECS, whether professionally, academi-cally or personally and apply it to whatever the future holds for me. It has been a great pleasure working for such a dynamic, dedicated and accomplished team of researchers, students and staff. I truly believe that CRECS is making great strides in the world of research and is continuing to make changes in our community and I am proud to say that I was a part of their team.

Challenging and Exciting Co-op SemesterJulie Ma < jma061@uottawa.ca >

Hiring a CO-OP student pays off!Hire a CO-OP student! Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s Deputy Director, Ben Berry believes in hir-ing a student to assist the operation of his organiza-tion.

“Hire one…It just pays off! We’ve got a great oppor-tunity here to hire uOttawa CO-OP students. We can give them a project and let the students run with it. I’ve often said, ‘Here’s the data…give me something back.’ It’s always been a positive experience.”

In January, the co-op program at the University of Ot-tawa will begin the placement process for the summer 2013 work term. There are more than 1300 highly

motivated students ready for co-op placements. “The uOt-tawa CO-OP program is one of the largest programs in the country. There are always a number of suitable candidates in the programs I am looking at, and I’ve always had a good experience.”

Interested in hiring a uOttawa student? Contact

Danielle.Delorme@uOttawa.ca

12

Évenéments CRSEC | CRECS Events

Comité consultatif | Advisory CommitteeKevin Barclay, Réseau local d’intégration des services de santé de Champlain | Senior Integration Specialist, Champlain Local Health Integration Network Pino Buffone, Superintendent du curriculum, Ottawa-Carleton District School Board | Superintendent of Curriculum, Ottawa-Carleton District School BoardRose Anne Devlin, Vice-doyenne à la recherche, Faculté des sciences sociales | Vice-Dean Research Faculty of Social SciencesTerry Hunt, Direction générale de la vérification et de l’évaluation, Commission de la fonction publique | Director General, Auditing and Evaluation, Public Service CommissionMary Jelinic, Superviseur du programme, Ministère des services à l’enfance et à la jeunesse | Program Supervisor, Developmental Services Ministry of Children and Youth ServicesMarilyn Kasian, Officier de recherche, Ottawa Carleton Catholic School Board | Research Officer, Ottawa Carleton Catholic School BoardRaymond Leblanc, Vice-doyen à la recherche et au développement du personnel, Faculté d’éducation | Vice-Dean Research and Professional Development, Faculty of EducationJean-Pierre Voyer, Président-directeur général, Société de recherche social appliqué | President and C.E.O., Social Research and Demonstration Corporation

Personnel et collaborateurs | Staff and CollaboratorsDirecteur | Director Brad Cousins Codirecteur | Co-Director Tim Aubry Comité de gestion | Management Committee John Sylvestre Marielle Simon Robert Flynn Elizabeth KristjanssonCoordinateur | Coordinator Alejandro Gomez Coordonnatrice Adjointe | Assistant Coordinator Samantha LapointeCoordonnateurs de la recherche | Research Coordinators Meagan Miller, Ontario Looking After Children Madeleine Anderson, Families First Joel Beaupré, Kids in Transition Abra Adamo, Population Health Interventions David Hole, Ottawa Neighborhood Study Katlyn Carr, Ottawa Neighborhood Study Associés de la recherche | Research Associates Cynthia Vincent, Ontario Looking After Children Elizabeth Hay, Health and Housing in Transition Stephanie Yamin, At Home / Chez Soi Stagiaire postdoctoral | Postdoctoral fellow Rebecca Cherner, Supported Housing Addiction Recovery Evaluation

Learning what works in improving high school students’ access to PSE In November, Jean-Pierre Voyer, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation and CRECS Advisory presented the ex-perimental impacts of the FUTURE

TO DISCOVER PROJECT. This project tested two new approaches designed to encourage students from lower income families to access post-secondary educa-tion by addressing two of the potential barriers these students face: a lack of adequate information about the benefits of PSE, and a perceived lack of financing to afford it. In response to these barriers, two new pro-grams were designed for testing using an experimental research design. Over 5,400 students from 51 high schools in New Brunswick and Manitoba consented to take part in the study.

Franco-Ontarian Teenagers’ Stress and Sociolinguistic Vitality

While students who are affected by stress in their everyday life or at school can develop different learning disabilities, many environ-mental factors can give rise to this stress. The literature on the topic has identified several key factors that can contribute to this stress, such as parenting styles, socioeco-nomic situation and social sup-

port. However, at this point, research has not explored the relationship between the stress experienced by students and sociolinguistic vitality. Yet, many studies carried out by different major health agencies have noted a divide between the health of linguistic minori-ties and that of their counterparts. This presentation will look at how the link between sociolinguistic vitality and stress affects Franco-Ontarian teenagers as well as at the next steps to take in the field of research with re-spect to this issue. Senior Researcher Cameron Mont-gomery and his research assistant Marc-Alexandre Prud’homme will be presenting this CRECS Noon-hour Colloquium on February 15. Please R.S.V.P. via email at crecs@uOttawa.ca.