National Evaluation of Diplomas: Cohort 2 - The First Year of Delivery

Gill Featherstone, Pauline Wade, Sarah Golden, Tami McCrone, Gill Haynes , Clare Southcott

30 June 2011

Available to download from the DfE website

The purpose of the national evaluation is to provide policy makers and practitioners with systematic and robust evidence which will enable them to make informed judgements about the outcomes of the Diplomas for different stakeholders and to make improvements to design and delivery, if appropriate.

The overall research design for the evaluation provides a complementary mixed-method approach to address the complex range of issues and aims associated with the implementation of the Diplomas. The study has three main strands: surveys of a range of stakeholders (including consortium leads, learners, teaching staff, parents, employers and Higher Education Institutions; a longitudinal programme of qualitative case studies; and statistical analysis of external datasets.

This report contains the findings of research as carried out in spring 2010, which explored experiences of the first year of delivery of the second cohort of Diploma learners (who started their Diploma in September 2009). It presents the findings from surveys of pre- and post-16 Diploma and comparison learners and in-depth interviews with key stakeholders and Diploma learners in a sub-sample of 15 case-study consortia.

The national evaluation of diplomas

Sponsor Details

DfE

Back to all publications