Evaluating workplace English language program success: Quantitative and qualitative assessments.

摘要

Research on workplace English programs suggests that program evaluation is essential to program success. Although researchers agree that program evaluation involves the learners, practitioners, and company management (Burt 1995; Mikulecky & Lloyd, 1996), no one evaluation method has been established or systematically implemented. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effectiveness of a variety of evaluation tools within D. L. Kirkpatrick and J. D. Kirkpatrick's (2006) four-level training evaluation model. The participants for this study come from three groups (n=36) of non-native English-speaking employees in healthcare and manufacturing companies in West Michigan, company representatives (n=12) such as supervisors and training facilitators, and the service providers (n=4). The learners participated in an onsite, ten-week workplace English language training and were evaluated using learning journals, standardized tests, pre- and post-interviews, and end-of-class evaluations. The results indicate that to prove workplace English program success, program administrators must work together with company representatives and practitioners to evaluate the reaction to the program, the measurable learning gains, changes in the learners' workplace behavior, as well as the overall results or programmatic impact on the company. It can be concluded that providing stakeholders with accurate program outcomes is only possible when informal assessments are used in conjunction with standardized tests.