Conducting Transparent Evaluations

As internships draw to an end, interns participate in a process of evaluation within their ministry contexts. The purpose of evaluation is to facilitate the intern's own learning in context and is designed to empower the intern in this process of formation for ministry. The method of evaluation is primarily one of reflection and conversation between the intern and the learning partners. In congregational settings, the lay and clergy partners will separately evaluate the intern. In nonprofit settings, the site and mentoring partners will separately evaluate the intern. Afterwards, interns continue to reflect upon the evaluations as they discuss them in colloquy.

The steps below describe the process in detail. As you prepare for the internship and for the seminarian evaluation process, please review samples of evaluations by a learning partner and an intern.

As you prepare for the internship and for the seminarian evaluation process, please find a demo of the two learning team evaluations: Learning Partners Intern Evaluation Demo and Seminarian’s Self Evaluation Demo.

Step1: Completing the evaluations

Final evaluations for the Fall and Spring term internships are due two weeks prior to the final colloquy session. For Summer session internships, the final evaluations are due by the last day of the internship.

Interns and learning partners complete the evaluation using online forms. Interns will find directions and links to the evaluation form under the "Final Evaluation Form Access Here" menu heading in their Blackboard course information. The Blackboard instructions include an invitation and link for interns to copy and paste into emails to send to their learning partners so they can access the form.

Intern and evaluators enter their email address on the form. When the form is submitted, the questions and answers are automatically formatted into a report that is sent back to the person’s email address and to the PM&M administrator. Persons who do not see the report in their mailboxes within a few hours should check the spam or junk folder for an email sent from no-reply@wufoo.com. If it is not there, they should send a message to the PM&M office at PMMAssistant@WesleySeminary.edu, including their first and last name and the name of the intern.

Step 2: Reviewing the evaluations

Once the learning partners and intern have received their emailed evaluation reports, they should meet to read over and discuss them as a team before the last colloquy meeting for the term. The intern will keep a written record of helpful suggestions and insights, points of agreement and disagreement, and whatever feedback may be conducive to professional growth. An option for taking notes is using a downloadable worksheet: Worksheet for Seminarian Discussions of Evaluations.

Step 3: Posting Notes to Blackboard

Step 4: Discussion with Colloquy Group

Step 5: Evaluation by Colloquy Leaders

The colloquy leaders will then complete their own evaluation of the intern using the online form. These are automatically sent to the PM&M office. The deadline for Fall and Spring term interns who are graduating is the Tuesday before graduation. For other Fall and Spring term interns, the deadline is two days before the May date that grades are due to the registrar. The due date for Summer term interns is the first Wednesday of the fall semester.

Step 6: Future Use of Evaluation Records

The seminarian will continue to have access to all evaluation records received in the PM&M office, where they are protected by the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). This information will be made available to persons outside the seminary only with the written and explicit permission of the seminarian, before and after graduation. Requests must be made using the official form found in the "PMM Evaluation Forms" section under Handbooks & Forms.

establishing a learning agreement photo with candles

Got questions?
Contact the PM&M Office
(PMMAssistant@WesleySeminary.edu)