Annual Program Evaluation

September 18, 2024

4400 University Dr.
Fairfax, VA 22030-4444

Board of Trustees
The Fund for American Studies
2024 Annual Program Evaluation

To the Board of Trustees,

I am pleased to submit my independent evaluation of the educational programs conducted by the Foundation for Teaching Economics from September 1, 2023 to August 31, 2024. This academic year was marked by continued growth and innovation across both in-person and virtual student and teaching programming. Compared to last academic year, the evaluation is based on written feedback from more than 2000 individuals (approximately 914 high school students and 1,104 teachers). Not included in my evaluation, but important to highlight as part of FTE’s continued growth and impressive innovation in its programming, is that this number does not include 281 Canadian teachers as part of a co-sponsored program with the Fraser Institute for a series of ten virtual one-day workshops on the “Realities of Socialism,” which had run in parallel with a series of workshops held in Las Vegas, Nevada for American teachers.

 

What’s most impressive is that the feedback from hundreds of students and teachers proved that such academic growth did not come at the expense of quality and innovation in administering and teaching a diversity of programming. Even with the disruptions related to the COVID-19 pandemic having effectively concluded, the continued success of FTE virtual programming, along with in-person educational programming to accommodate an expanding number of participants across its student and teacher programs, resonates throughout the written feedback provided across all programs. I am very pleased to report that FTE has been overwhelmingly successful in its continued mission of teaching the economic way of thinking.

 

An analysis of empirical surveys, along with written feedback from participants, as well as pre and post testing, continue to demonstrate that FTE programs are essential for helping equip both students and teachers with relevant and powerful pedagogical tools and instruction methods, conducive to excellence in economic education and making teachers more effective economic educators. In summary, both students and teachers across all programs consistently and overwhelmingly praised:

 

• FTE instructors for their clear content as well as engagement with students;

 

• FTE content for its timeliness, clarity of exposition, and responsiveness to questions in the classroom;

 

• FTE programs for enhancing their understanding of the economic way of thinking;

 

The overall result of this impact, both among students and teachers across all programs, is most reflected by the overwhelming enthusiasm that participants expressed in recommending FTE courses and programming to other individuals.

 

Pre- and post-tests of the high school students attending Economics for Leaders (EFL) programs revealed positive and improved changes in their understanding of economic concepts compared to last year. Growing from 796 students in the 2022-2023 academic year to 828 students this past academic year, the post-test results showed a percentage-point increase of over 13 percent from the pre-test results. This is an improvement over the results from the pre-tes to post-test scores of the 2022-2023 academic year, which revealed that students improved their understanding of economic concepts by almost 12 percent.

 

One aspect of the pre-tests and post-tests to highlight is the more significant improvement of understanding of economic concepts by students among the regular, in-person cohorts (15 percent increase) as well as among the virtual cohorts (12 percent increase). The results of the virtual cohorts also reveal FTE’s continued ability to improve and adapt its teaching techniques to a virtual setting in a post-COVID era. Among the in-person EFL programs from this past academic year, the William & Mary Cohort reported a dramatic improvement, an almost 26 percent increase in its post-test result. As another comparative result to highlight, whereas the UCLA cohort reported an almost 18 percent increase in its post-test result in the 2022-2023 academic year, the UCLA cohort this past academic year report a post-test increase of 21 percent. Students praised the instructors for their ability to make challenging content understandable and praised their instruction methods and techniques as well as their ability to make challenging content understandable, their responsiveness to questions, and praised their instructional methods and techniques.

 

Results from participants’ feedback and comprehension tests clearly show the positive impact of FTE programs on participants’ learning and their ability to bring the economic way of thinking into the classroom. The transition into a post-pandemic world has led the successful growth and innovation in FTE programs that has proved not only sustainable but resilient to a post-pandemic academic environment. This is marked by the praise of the various virtual workshops and webinars across many programs which speak to the clarity, thoughtfulness, and enthusiasm of FTE teachers.

 

It is also particularly important to highlight and stress the importance of FTE’s most recent partnership with the Fraser Institute and express the particular relevance and importance of expanding its programs on topics directly related to the economic analysis of socialism and its history. It is now over a generation since the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of central planning in Eastern and Central Europe, as well as other parts of the world, which for a time seemed to have settled the 20th century debate between economists of the “Austrian school” and socialist economists over the possibility of economic calculation under socialism. However, a whole new generation of students have grown up with no living memory of the Cold War and socialism behind the Iron Curtain. With living memories of such events fading, the presumption that technological advances associated with computing power and the prospect of artificial intelligence have renewed interest in the economic feasibility of socialism, rendering FTE programs that address the impossibility of implementing socialism because of a “knowledge problem” inherent to this economic system as ever more important.

 

Based on my review of the data, FTE has continued to deliver excellence in economic education as it continues to grow its student and teacher programs. Given my own role as an economics educator, I must say that FTE is providing much needed training and exposition on the economic topics and education methodology required in high schools, particularly the role that private property and freedom of contract under the rule of law play as the institutional arrangements necessary to facilitate economic prosperity and human flourishing by harnessing the creative powers of a free society. Moreover, the centrality of economic literacy grounded in positive economic analysis delivered by FTE across its various student programs is vital to cultivating responsible decision-making for the next generation of future leaders.

Best wishes,

Rosolino Candela, Ph.D.