Increase professional development opportunities

Utilize available technology to reach more corrections professionals through the use of internet broadcasts.  Participants would be those in the field of community corrections whose departments had to cut budgets and impose travel restrictions and were unable to send staff to trainings that may require travel.

Deliver four internet broadcasts covering critical professional development competencies and knowledge. A post broadcast survey will be conducted at the conclusion of the broadcast to measure important competencies learned by participants in which 85% of participants will accurately answer the competency questions.

CMIT delivered two internet broadcasts this fiscal year.  Since this was our first year conducting internet broadcasts, the Institute used this year to learn the process of putting on a broadcast and become fully aware of the logistical requirements.  Also, with this being a legislative year, our pool of target guest speakers was not available.

The first broadcast was a panel discussion format and therefore, competency questions were not asked as the discussion was free-flowing and often driven by comments from other panelists or questions from the field through the GoToMeeting system.  Questions regarding usefulness of the material and satisfaction with the webinar were asked.  Out of the 36 responses, 77.8% felt “Satisfied” and 11.1% felt “Somewhat Satisfied” with the webinar.  When asked if the participant would recommend this course to a colleague, 61.1% stated they would “Definitely recommend” and 25% stated they would “Probably recommend”.  When asked how much the course will help the participant in their daily responsibilities, 38.9% felt it would “Help a lot” and 47.2% stated it would “Help a little”. 

The second broadcast was more of a lecture format; therefore, 5 competency questions were asked in the post webinar survey.  There were 62 responses with each question, and out of the 5 questions, 4 had a correct response rate higher than 85%, with 3 questions having over 90% correct response rate.  One question had a correct response rate of 71%.  Additional questions regarding usefulness and satisfaction with the webinar were also asked.  Overall, 64.5% were “Satisfied” and 29% were “Somewhat satisfied” with the webinar. When asked if the participant would recommend the course to a colleague, 62.9% stated they would “Definitely recommend” and 29% stated they would “Probably recommend” the course. When asked if the course will help them in their daily responsibilities, 55.7% felt it would “Help a lot” and 42.6% felt it would “Help a little”.

Review post training participant information to determine the number of participants attending each professional development opportunity.  We will utilize two forms of post broadcast information to determine the number of participants attending each session.  The first will be based on reports from the GoToWebinar system and the second will be post webinar surveys using methods such as Survey Monkey.  We will utilize two methods due to the fact that more than one person could be viewing the broadcast on one computer, as well as some may not actually view the broadcast on the computer, but call in via telephone and listen to the broadcast. If someone only calls into the system, they will not register with the GoThisWebinar system.  We will ask those who are not logged on through the system to communicate with the coordinator of the program so that a post broadcast survey can be sent to them.   The locations that will have more than one person viewing the broadcast will be asked to forward the survey to others that attended with them.  This is our first year to offer training programs using various forms of technology such as internet broadcast.  We will use this year to set a bench mark for future years.

The first internet broadcast was conducted September 21, 2012.  Based on the Performance Details report from GoToWebinar, the maximum number of sites logged on at any point during the broadcast was 92.  According to the 36 post broadcast survey responses received, there were between 0 and 15 viewing the broadcast at each location, with 0-2 participants receiving the highest number of responses.  The second internet broadcast was February 6, 2013.  According to the GoToWebinar Performance Details report, a maximum of 99 sites were logged on at any one point.  There were technical difficulties during this broadcast, in that only 100 sites were able to utilize the GoToWebinar system due to an account issue with the GoToWebinar account.  Based on the Performance Details, 333 were registered to view the broadcast and 272 sites attempted to log on to view the broadcast.  Once the issue was discovered regarding the maximum number of sites that were able to log in, an email was sent to all registered users with a link to view the broadcast on the SHSU Online Live Stream website.  We are unable to track how many viewed the broadcast through the SHSU Online Live Stream website; however, of the 58 that responded to a question in the post broadcast survey regarding how they viewed the webinar, at least 22 viewed the broadcast through the SHSU Online Live Stream website.  According to the 61 responses received from the post broadcast survey, there were between 0 and more than 21 viewing the webinar at each location, with 0-2 or more received the highest number of responses. 

The broadcasts this year were coordinated with the Community Justice Assistance Division only.  In the future, CMIT staff will work with leadership from the Community Justice Assistance Division, the Texas Juvenile Justice Department, and county corrections to develop and deliver more internet broadcasts and to reach more practioners. There is currently a panel discussion internet broadcast scheduled for September 6. CMIT has also worked with SHSU Online and Continuing Education department staff to ensure the number of allowed logins to the GoToMeeting system has been increased to allow more participation. 

Increase the number of training hours provided to community corrections, county corrections, and court personal to aid in professional development and continuing education requirements for the field.

The CMIT Assistant Director maintains a spreadsheet of all trainings coordinated and hosted by the Institute.  When a staff member completes hosting/facilitating a training, information regarding the training, such as number of participants and number of training hours provided, is submitted to the Assistant Director and is updated to the CMIT Training Spreadsheet.  CMIT is striving to increase the number of training hours provided to the field of corrections by 10% from FY 2012 to 3256.25 hours in FY 2013.

The Institute increased the training hours provided to the field to 3,210.5, which is an increase of 8.5%.  This is a difference of 46 hours from 10%. If there are not enough participants for a training, a training is cancelled; therefore, taking away training hours we provide.  A reason we may have to cancel a training was due to lack of participant registrationgs.  Also, agency budget constraints to pay for registration fees, or travel, also result in few participants.  Also, unexpected emergencies from participants may also play a part in training cancellation. 

CMIT will work on marketing training events better through use of technology such as social networking website, list servs, and our website.  We will ensure any marketing materials provide all the pertinent information needed to ensure participants know exactly what topics are being trained on.  We will also use other technology for trainings, such as more internet broadcasts to aid those agencies that have budget constraints.  The Institute will also work closely with advisory councils for the field to ensure we are provided training on needed topics. 

Provide senior and executive leadership with valuable and worthy professional development training

Develop executive level training focusing on the leadership competency of critical thinking and strategic planning. Provide a training session for leadership that currently serve an agency/department as the governing/senior administrator or leadership that are viewed or interpreted by an agency/department as being a future successor for such a role with insight and knowledge regarding critical thinking and its application.

Deliver the program in Spring 2013 with the plan of presenting/delivering two annual training sessions to no more than 24 participants per session that is satisfactorily and acceptably valued by the attendees. 

The program was delivered May 20-24, 2013, with 23 participants.  A 24th participant cancelled at the last minute due to an Agency Audit.

Training Session: Throughout the day or at the end of the day, participants will complete an Instructor Evaluation/survey (Numerical, Descriptive or Graphic Scales) for each speaker, segment or topic. The evaluation/survey will assess the instructor’s knowledge of the topic, if the instructor clearly presented the content, if the instructor paced the presentation well, if the student felt free to question/disagree/express ideas, if the presentation will assist the student, overall satisfaction, most valued and least valued aspect of the training, and any additional comments or suggestions.   The evaluations have a rating system of 1 to 5, with 1 being the lowest rating and 5 being the highest rating (best rating).  Each of the 6 questions on each evaluation should have an average of 3.0 or higher.

There were 5 different speaker evaluations and all 23 participants completed each evaluation.   The lowest average for any of the 6 questions for all 5 speaker evaluations was a 4.26.  The highest average was 4.96.

Post Event: No sooner than seven days following the training event a post evaluation/survey (Numerical, Descriptive or Graphic Scales) will be forwarded to the attendees. The attendees will be asked to complete a survey which may include  questions such as : how applicable was the information/session content to the role you serve in your agency/department today; do you believe the content of the session will aide you in your future leadership positions; looking back today, what is your biggest take away from the session; how can the program be improved; what topics did you find valuable; how can the Cost-Benefit Analysis presentation be further edited or improved to serve as a better resource of information; what are your overall feelings about the program; are there any specific program topics or areas of interest that you think should be included in the program that were not addressed and how likely is it that you would recommend the program to others in your field.  Program acceptability and satisfactory achievement will be determined based on completed evaluations/surveys (Numerical, Descriptive or Graphic Scales). 75% of the respondents must rate the subject matter 3.0 or greater when measured Numerically, Moderately Applicable, Very Applicable, Moderately, Somewhat Extensively and Extensively when measured Descriptively or as Acceptable or Satisfactory when measured on a Graphic Scale.

The post program evaluation was administered electronically via SurveyMonkey.  The response rate was 70% with 16 of 23 participants responding to the survey.  Of the 16 responses, 9 (56.25%) felt the program content was “Extremely applicable”, 4 (25%), felt the content was “Very applicable”, and 3 (18.75%) felt the content was moderately applicable.  When asked if the participant believe the content of the program will aide in their future leadership roles, 13 (81.25%) felt it would “Extensively” aide and 3 (18.75%) felt it would “Somewhat extensively” aide.  When asked how likely the participant would recommend the program to other professionals in the field, 14 (87.50%) stated they would absolutely recommend it.  Other questions were open-ended questions, such as What is the biggest take away from the program?; How can the program be improved?; Overall feelings about the program; and additional program topics or areas of interest that the participant felt should be included in the program?

Another Senior Level Executive Leadership Program was conducted August 25-30, 2013, that also received very good evaluations.  CMIT leadership will assess all evaluations from both programs, as well as consider verbal comments and suggests made during the programs and determine if the program should stay as is, or if the program could be divided into multiple programs and cover some of the information in more depth.