Searching for Tomorrow's Leaders: An in-depth mixed method study of a multi-day leadership program

Abstract

Temple University's Leadership Academy (LA), instituted in 2006, is a six and a half -month leadership development program for mid-to-senior-level administrators and full-time faculty at Temple University. This mixed method study addresses the program's effectiveness from the perspective of 216 graduates who took part in the academy during the first six years of its operation. Leadership development programs work to enhance the affective, behavioral, and cognitive skills of program participants. At present, few research studies provide in-depth evaluations of such programs. To determine the effectiveness of the LA at Temple University (TU), a 28-question electronic survey was distributed to the graduates of the program to gather data on participant reactions, transfer of learning, and behavioral change. Collected information also included responses from 15 interviews designed to augment the survey data. Both quantitative and qualitative data were analyzed. Two different theoretical models of program evaluation were used to determine program effectiveness: Kirkpatrick's (2006) Four Levels of Evaluation model and Grove's (2002) EvaluLead Framework for leadership program evaluation. Comparisons made and inferences drawn from the data led to an assessment of overall program effectiveness and the determination of whether key differences existed across several demographic categories: gender, age, race, primary role, etc.