Transportation Education Development Pilot Program at University of Vermont Transportation Research Center

In the past decade, an increasing investment in pilot programs has advanced transportation workforce development initiatives. The Transportation Education Development Pilot Program (TEDPP) at the University of Vermont Transportation Research Center (TRC) is one such initiative from FHWA's efforts toward new projects that will demonstrate successful outcomes and pathways for replication. Paralleling this initiative, developmental evaluation has emerged as a new paradigm for assessing evolving programs that are complex, innovative, and involve multiple partners and sectors. This paper provides a case study of a developmental evaluation conducted on the TEDPP initiative at the University of Vermont Transportation Research Center (TRC). The two goals of the TEDPP initiative were to encourage new entrants into the transportation workforce and to retain and improve the effectiveness of current transportation employees. Although internal formative and summative evaluation measures were addressed throughout the TEDPP implementation (2008 to 2012), a comprehensive developmental evaluation for the entire project was undertaken in 2012–2013. This study describes the developmental evaluation in terms of methodology, evaluation, key findings, and suggested recommendations for transportation workforce development projects. The TEDPP at University of Vermont TRC accomplished many important outcomes. Although these outcomes differed from those conceived at the start of the project, the overall goals were still supported. The nature of this developmental evaluation revealed unexpected benefits and provided a framework for program expansion in terms of audience and offerings. This study makes a case for including a developmental evaluation process in transportation workforce development efforts, not only to track progress but to guide continuous program innovation.