Indiana University's Advance College Project (ACP) is an accredited member of the National Alliance for Concurrent Enrollment Partnerships (NACEP), a charter organization formed by IU and six other founding institutions. Its work is to safeguard the quality of this type of program. Evaluation is a major component in the NACEP standards that Concurrent Enrollment Partnerships (CEPs) must meet in order to be accredited.

From 1982, the first year for ACP, evaluation has been an important component of the program. The five goals of the evaluation activities are:

1. to facilitate implementation of ACP by identifying program strengths and weaknesses and by documenting what transpired within each high school for each course offered by ACP,
2. to assess how well IU's course standards were being met for each ACP course as it was taught within each high school,
3. to assess the impact of ACP on its various participants, e.g., the students, the teachers, and other high school personnel involved in ACP activities,
4. to establish data in order to analyze longitudinal trends that could tell us what areas need attention, support, revision, etc., and
5. to meet the standards of the National Alliance for Concurrent Enrollment Partnerships (NACEP).

These objectives have been translated into specific data gathering activities that occur throughout the school year. Data are collected from ACP students, graduates, teachers, guidance counselors, principals and faculty liaisons. The research and evaluation component of ACP is necessary to develop a long-term database from which to assess the program.

Evaluation instruments for teachers include the Summer Seminar Evaluation Form, Review Day Evaluation Form, Final Examination Comparability Study, and the ACP End-of-Course Teacher Evaluation. Evaluation instruments for students include End-of-Course Student Evaluation and the Follow-up Senior Survey of former ACP students. In addition to these activities, courses are evaluated on a three-year cycle. Each of these instruments is described below:

1. Summer Seminar Evaluation Form and Review Day Evaluation Form: At the conclusion of every summer seminar and review day, the ACP staff and the IU faculty are interested to learn how teachers benefit from their experience and to solicit suggestions for program and seminar improvement. The instrument used is the evaluation form. These questionnaires are used to identify expectations, evaluate training received, and identify any problems anticipated in implementing the information in the high school setting.
2. Final Examination Comparability Study: Not all ACP courses give final examinations, but where the IU course equivalent has a final examination, the ACP students in that course will also have a final examination. The ACP instructor will administer the final examination at the completion of the ACP course. Since high school and university semesters do not end at the same time, the high school final examinations will usually follow those given at the IU campus.
   Final examinations are weighted differently from one subject to the other. Final examination scores are used in ACP comparability studies. The comparability measures and use of the final examination, including its weight in figuring final grades, are discussed in the summer seminars.
3. ACP End-of-Course Teacher Evaluation: After teaching an ACP course, teachers are asked to complete a brief questionnaire concerning course implementation. The results of the teacher questionnaire are used to monitor the level of teacher satisfaction with the course and the program, to identify common and unique problems that have evolved from implementing the course in the high school, and to assess teacher perceptions of the impact the course and the program are having on the students and the school.
4. ACP End-of-Course Student Evaluation: All students enrolled in an ACP course are asked to evaluate the course through a course evaluation. While a set of common items appears in all student evaluation forms, some items are unique to a course. For example, in chemistry there are items dealing with laboratory work and in English there are items assessing the student's reaction to group work. Teachers administer the course evaluation only to students enrolled for college credit.
5. Senior Survey: The ACP students who graduate from high school in the spring annually receive a follow-up survey at their home address in December of that same year. The survey is used to discover where ACP course work has transferred and where it has not, as well as why that has occurred. This information is then shared through the ACP Credit Transfer Lists. The follow-up survey also allows us to better assess the value of particular ACP courses in students' subsequent college work.

ACP produces a number of reports using the data collected from the instruments described above. Most notable are the following:

1. ACP Annual Report: ACP prepares an annual program report documenting student participation rates for all IU campuses, ACP courses, as well as teacher participation rates for courses, training, and review seminars.
2. Annual High School Report: ACP creates an annual high school report documenting the analyses of the data gathered from course enrollment statistics and from the evaluation.
3. Senior Survey Summary: ACP collects information annually from ACP students who graduate from high school. This information summarizes course credits that students are able to transfer and accesses the value of ACP courses in students' subsequent college work.