---

Rock Solid Evaluation Team Projects

Kentucky Real ID Survey

In 2020, the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC) began rollout of the federal REAL ID requirements, which establishes a nationwide set of standards for state-issued driver’s licenses and non-driver identification cards. KYTC contracted with Rock Solid Evaluation Services to conduct a statewide survey of adult residents representing all 12 Kentucky Highway Districts to gauge their level of awareness about REAL ID and inform the Cabinet’s communication strategies. Because of COVID-19, REAL ID implementation has extended into 2021 and Rock Solid will provide additional administrations of the Kentucky REAL ID Survey to help KYTC assess the impact of their public awareness campaign efforts and further target specific regions of the state or demographic groups.

GRREC / OVEC kid•FRIENDLy Project Evaluation

In 2013, the Rock Solid Evaluation Team was awarded a four-year $2.3 million grant to evaluate the Green River Regional Educational Cooperative's (GRREC) and Ohio Valley Education Cooperative's (OVEC) $42 million Race to the Top-District kid•FRIENDLy Project. Twenty-two school districts containing 112 schools participated in the kid•FRIENDLy Project. Rock Solid provided compliance monitoring, engaged in formative and summative assessment of project progress, and worked with stakeholders to develop data collection tools and other instruments that effectively measured project outcomes.

Standards and Indicators Scholastic Review

The Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) developed the Standards and Indicators for School Improvement (SISI) as a standards-based approach to whole school reform. The Scholastic Audit was then created as a week-long external evaluation of schools by trained audit teams based on the SISI. Together the SISI and Scholastic Audit have been recognized as one of the most effective school improvement framework/tools in the nation. But cost ($12,000 per Audit) led to its demise. Members of the Rock Solid Evaluation team, along with other WKU colleagues, updated and revised the original standards (Standards and Indicators for School Improvement-Revised, SISI-R) and developed the Standards and Indicators Scholastic Review (SISR) to replace the Scholastic Audit with a set of self-report teacher perceptual scales (30-45 minutes at no cost compared to expensive week-long external audit teams).

Kentucky Teaching, Empowering, Leading and Learning (TELL) Survey
The Kentucky Teaching, Empowering, Leading and Learning (TELL) Survey provides statewide data on educators' perceptions of teaching conditions for eight constructs: Time; Facilities & Resources; Community Support and Involvement; Managing Student Conduct; Teacher Leadership; School Leadership; Professional Development; and Instructional Practice and Support. Funded by Kentucky Council for Post-Secondary Education, the TELL research team has carried out three projects using the TELLKentucky Survey 2011 database and produced several technical reports and conference presentations.