Welcome to the main evaluation web site for the Undergraduate Curriculum Development Testbed (UCDT), a program initiative funded by the University of Michigan and the National Science Foundation to foster institution-wide reform of undergraduate education. The Testbed intends to bring together innovative curricular elements in the design of interdisciplinary undergraduate lecture courses and laboratory modules in the field of earth system science and global change. The overall goal of the proposed work is to establish improved methodologies for the infusion of interdisciplinary courses and materials into the undergraduate programs of major research universities.

The UCDT implementation plan called for the evaluation team to work closely with the curriculum development team to create a meaningful evaluation plan. The development of the evaluation plan, activities, and products was guided by four major principles:

A formative prospective dominated evaluation activities and was used to identify and to develop relevant indicators for improving UCDT activities.

To ensure that these efforts are maximally useful information, evaluation became an integral part of UCDT activities rather than last-minute add-ons.

Given the broad scope of UCDT goals and activities, the evaluation team used multiple approaches to understanding UCDT's impact on macro (institutional) and
micro (individual) outcomes within a diverse educational community.

In addition, every effort was made to use (adapt) existing sources of evaluation data (for example, the student-ratings of instructor effectiveness provided by U of M's Center for Research on Learning and Teaching) to collect data.

Last update: 23 June 1998