The Institute’s purpose in funding Scale-up evaluations is
- to determine whether or not fully developed interventions are effective when they are implemented under conditions that would be typical if a school district or other education delivery setting were to implement them (i.e., routine practice; implementation without special support from the developer or the research team) and
- when they are evaluated by an independent evaluator,
- to generate evidence that an intervention works under different school and population conditions (e.g., urban vs. rural districts; with vs. without high proportions of English learners), and
- to understand the organizational supports that are needed to ensure sufficient implementation of the core components (active ingredients) of the intervention
- to determine the effects of theoretically important moderators of the intervention.
The key differences between Scale-up evaluations and Efficacy/Replication evaluations have to do with
- the delivery of the intervention,
- the conduct and oversight of the evaluation, and
- the existence of strong prior evidence pertaining to the efficacy of the intervention.
Significance:To be considered for Scale-up Evaluation awards, applicants must propose to evaluate a fully developed intervention that has strong evidence of efficacy of the intervention. Scale-up Evaluation applicants address the significance of their project by (i) posing clear aims (hypotheses or research questions) for the project, (ii) clearly describing the intervention, (iii) describing the intervention’s theory of change, (iv) providing strong evidence of the educationally meaningful effects that are expected, (v) detailing the conditions under which the intervention will be implemented, and (vi) a compelling rationale for evaluating the proposed intervention, which may include input from education stakeholders such as practitioners and policymakers.