1. January, 2010 Betsy Ott, Charlotte Creason Co-Chairs, Assessment Committee Molly McCoy Assistant Director, Institutional Effectiveness 1

2. Results of 08-09 Assessment  THANKS for all you’ve done in preparing your Academic Unit Assessment Reports! We’ve come a long way! The members of the Assessment Committee evaluated each of the 65 Unit reports Most of the 4-Column reports are in good shape Molly, Charlotte and I will be helping each of you finish those reports in January and February 2

3. Purpose of this workshop  Based on what we’ve read in the 08-09 (and 07-08) 4-Column reports;  Informed by our own professional development (workshops and conferences on academic assessment):  OUR GOAL is to help you to develop a system of meaningful, actionable assessment for your academic unit(s). 3

4. Part One 4

5. Academic Unit Assessment Worksheet  This worksheet will help you prepare, implement, and complete your academic unit assessments.  The worksheet has 5 steps: Preparation: ○ Step 1 – Set a Goal ○ Step 2 – Form an Action Plan Implementation: ○ Step 3 – Write your Outcome ○ Step 4 – Determine your Assessment Strategy Completion: ○ Step 5 – Plan your Execution 5

6. Preparation  Preparation is necessary to: make sure your SLOs have a meaningful connection to program/curriculum improvement; make sure your SLOs are concrete and specific enough to measure 6

7. Step 1: Set a Goal  Emphasize improvement in student success  Where possible, initiate change at the program level  Suggestions: Focus on a problem in your area that you’d like to solve Set a higher benchmark for successful completion Follow up on a previous year’s SLO Expand on some other idea that relates to improving curriculum 7

8. Step 2: Phrase your Action Plan  Make this a concrete change you intend to make that will help you reach your goal  Suggestions: Implement a new prerequisite Change the order of topics Increase time spent on a specific topic Give more homework on a topic Provide tutoring 8

9. Implementation  Implementation allows you to ensure that your SLO matches your goal and your action plan Determine what Student Learning Outcome you will measure to see if your change addresses your goal adequately Decide how you will assess the SLO to see if your change has been successful 9

10. Step 3: Write your Outcome  Your SLO should address the change you have decided on in your Action Plan  SLOs must be phrased using active, assessable verbs (including, but not limited to, those in “Bloom’s Taxonomy”)  Keep your focus on a single component (not a broad, vague statement) 10

11. Step 4: Determine your Assessment Strategy  Make sure your assessment tool actually measures your outcome (which matches your action plan, which aligns with your goal)  Spell out your assessment tool in sufficient detail to determine what you’ll need to accomplish it, and to confirm that you have everything you need  Set the criteria for success 11

12. Completion  Completion includes planning for, conducting, reporting, and closing the loop on each SLO. 12

13. Step 5: Plan your Execution  Determine what form your results should take, based on your criteria and your assessment method  Decide how the results will be analyzed  Set up a timeline for completing your assessment and analyzing your results  Schedule necessary faculty meetings (for both before and after the assessment/analysis)  List any documentation you will need, along with a plan to generate needed documents  Set a deadline for entering your information in TracDat that complies with Institutional Effectiveness timelines 13

14. Part Two 14

15. Assessing Academic Unit Reports  Assessment Committee developed the rubric for scoring annual 4-column reports for academic units  This rubric was used for the first time Fall 2009  Feedback on the components of the rubric and the assessment process will help the Committee improve the process for 2009-10 15

16. Practice Review  See your 4-column reports through the eyes of the Assessment Committee reviewers  Use the provided handouts to review the three SLOs  Score each SLO on the provided scoring rubric 16

17. Analysis of Practice Review  What problems did you find in evaluating each column?  What issues do you have with the rubric? 17

18. Part Three 18

19. Making Use of the Workshop  Now that you have a process for creating meaningful, actionable, assessable SLOs, and  A perspective on how your SLOs will be assessed:  Take your current 2009-10 SLOs, and admire, edit, improve, enrich, or even replace what you have. 19

20. Providing Feedback  Assessment activities need to be assessed!  Please provide your feedback on this workshop, the assessment scoring rubric, the academic unit reviews, or any other aspects of Academic Assessment: Betsy Ott Charlotte Creason Molly McCoy 20