The gap reduction design, which was developed as part of the bilingual education evaluation
system (BEES) for the evaluation of Title VII programs, compares differences in project and
comparison groups' performance gaps at pretest and at posttest. The design provides a meaningful way of determining the educational significance of progress made by project participants.
In regard to program effects assessment, the design is a weak experimental design, even though
it is an improvement over the similar norm-referenced evaluation model developed for Chapter
1 program evaluations. To obtain program effect estimates, BEES should be implemented in its
totality.
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