[Saltassessmentworkinggroup] Report on 1500 colleges learning assessments

[Hazel Weiser]

In the copy of the article I sent earlier today from the Chronicle of Higher
Education, the following link to the report itself was inactive.  Here it
is: http://www.learningoutcomeassessment.org/NILOAsurveyresults09.htm

Namaste, hazel

Hazel Weiser, Executive Director
Society of American Law Teachers -- SALT
Public Advocacy Center, Room 223
Touro Law Center
225 Eastview Drive
Central Islip, NY 11722
hweiser at saltlaw.org
631.650.2310

Explore our new website: www.saltlaw.org

SALT Annual Dinner, Saturday, January 9th, 7:00 pm, Hotel Monteleone, New
Orleans--Tickets are on sale now!

a community of progressive law teachers working for justice, diversity, and
academic excellence


-----Original Message-----
From: saltassessmentworkinggroup-bounces at lists.washlaw.edu
[mailto:saltassessmentworkinggroup-bounces at lists.washlaw.edu] On Behalf Of
Hazel Weiser
Sent: Wednesday, October 28, 2009 10:41 AM
To: 'Andi Curcio'; saltassessmentworkinggroup at lists.washlaw.edu
Subject: Re: [Saltassessmentworkinggroup] Chronicle of Higher Education
article

Here is the article on assessment from today's Chronicle of Higher
Education:

October 27, 2009
An Expert Surveys the Assessment Landscape
 
Ric Cradick, Indiana University
George D. Kuh directs the National Institute for Learning Outcomes
Assessment.
Enlarge Photo 
  
Ric Cradick, Indiana University
George D. Kuh directs the National Institute for Learning Outcomes
Assessment.
By Eric Hoover

Colleges and universities have plenty of tools, but they must learn to use
them more effectively. That is how George D. Kuh describes the state of
assessing what college students learn.
Mr. Kuh directs the National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment, a
collaboration among Indiana University at Bloomington, the University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and other groups like the National Center for
Higher Education Management Systems. This week, the institute released "More
Than You Think, Less Than We Need: Learning Outcomes Assessment in American
Higher Education," a report that describes how more than 1,500 colleges
measure what students learn.
About three-quarters had developed common learning outcomes for all
undergraduate students, and the most common use of assessment data was to
prepare for accreditation, according to the report. Although the vast
majority of institutions have systemized ways of assessing student learning,
most have few, if any, staff members assigned to it, the report said. And
two-thirds of provosts said more faculty engagement would help them measure
learning outcomes better, while almost as many cited a need for greater
assessment expertise on their campuses.
On Tuesday, The Chronicle asked Mr. Kuh, who is also a professor of higher
education at Indiana, to share his thoughts on assessment.
Q. Please give us your 20,000-foot-high view of assessment at colleges and
universities: What's most encouraging? And what's of greatest concern?
A. What's most encouraging is that there's plenty more going on here,
certainly, than higher-education critics think. What's still disconcerting
is that I don't see a lot of evidence of closing the loop. There's a lot of
data around, there's some evidence it's being used in a variety of ways, but
we still don't know if that information is being transferred in such a way
as to change practices for the better. That's still the place where we're
falling short. There are not a lot of places that are spending a lot on
assessment, in terms of analyzing data through professional eyes, and people
being able to give a synthesized picture of what's going on at an
institution.
Q. The institute's just about a year old now. How would you describe its
purpose?
A. Our purpose for putting together something formal was to have a vehicle
to bring together a cacophony of voices working on assessment at national
and regional levels. Nobody really had the resources, or the time and
energy, to look across the national landscape to provide an in-depth and
almost real-time profile of what this work is about, where it's going, and
to what degree it's making a difference. Moreover, we want to learn more
about what tools are appropriate for what purpose, and we want to press
institutions to do more productive work with data they have, and to be
appropriately transparent about what they're learning.
Q. And what do you plan to do in the coming months?
A. One of the things we're doing is looking at institutional Web sites to
see how transparent they are with student learning outcomes. The short
answer is it's not always easy to find. So we're going to spend some time
looking at the impact of the Voluntary System of Accountability. It's one
thing for schools to sign up, it's another to post the information and to
show that they're actually doing something with it. It's not about posting a
score on a Web site-it's about doing something with the data.
Q. You've talked about how even solid assessment data may or may not make
any sense to an applicant. How can colleges make information about learning
outcomes more accessible and more relevant to prospective students and
parents?
A. One thing is to put up samples of student work, the project that came out
of an architecture design class, or a piece of writing, or a sculpture, some
authentic work that would represent most of whatever majors there are on a
campus. Now, this does not give you comparative information, but most of the
numbers are going to be meaningless to parents and applicants, except to say
that more students score above 70 at institution A than at institution B. I
also think that if we can work more closely with accreditors to know what
institutions have by way of measuring student learning, we could come up
with a better template for the public. The challenge is that most parents of
prospective students are not asking institutions for this information. There
are people who are demanding that information on behalf of the public, but
John Q. Public, he just doesn't know what to look for.
Q. The report concludes that receiving faculty cooperation in documenting
learning outcomes is at the top of provosts' wish lists. What can
institutions do to promote that kind of cooperation?
A. It's not an overnight process. But we need to be thinking about what the
next generation of faculty are doing, those who are now in graduate
programs. We need to make assessment a part of their work. Portfolios and
rubrics are starting to take hold. The important thing is to make them more
effective. There are many faculty members who are doing assessment now, but
not necessarily in ways that we can scale up to the institutional level.
Some say, "I am doing assessment. I'm assigning grades and I'm giving a lot
of feedback. What do you want from me?" What we want is for assessment to
become a public, shared responsibility, so there should be departmental
leadership. It should be part of faculty members' annual review. How common
is it that when a faculty member is reviewed annually, there is some
attention paid to student assessment? Institutions have to value this work,
and in many cases, faculties need more support for developing good
assessment tools themselves. We can make a shift here, but we have to be
very, very intentional about it, and have places on campuses where faculty
can get help doing it.
Q. Some administrators suggest that the recession might be the crisis that
forces institutions to get more serious about assessment, as leaders
continue to make tough choices about where to put their money. But
considering that nearly half of the provosts surveyed said that they already
need more resources to conduct better assessments, what do you make of that
prediction?
A. If there's one thing institutions do even less than take information
about student learning and use it to change what they do, it is to eliminate
ineffective programs and services. We have an add-on mentality. So while I
would like to believe that we will innovate and increase learning
productivity, I don't think this crisis will do it. The next couple of years
are going to be really, really bad, and I'm not sure that's when you get
that creativity and innovation. We just don't have enough good examples of
how institutions use this data to innovate.


Hazel Weiser, Executive Director
Society of American Law Teachers -- SALT
Public Advocacy Center, Room 223
Touro Law Center
225 Eastview Drive
Central Islip, NY 11722
hweiser at saltlaw.org
631.650.2310

Explore our new website: www.saltlaw.org

SALT Annual Dinner, Saturday, January 9th, 7:00 pm, Hotel Monteleone, New
Orleans--Tickets are on sale now!

a community of progressive law teachers working for justice, diversity, and
academic excellence


-----Original Message-----
From: saltassessmentworkinggroup-bounces at lists.washlaw.edu
[mailto:saltassessmentworkinggroup-bounces at lists.washlaw.edu] On Behalf Of
Andi Curcio
Sent: Tuesday, October 27, 2009 6:18 PM
To: saltassessmentworkinggroup at lists.washlaw.edu
Subject: [Saltassessmentworkinggroup] How do you want to handle replies?

Hi all,

I have privately gotten some great feedback on substantive questions I have
asked, and I suspect the same is true for Alicia [I know Gary's response to
her request for help raised some interesting thoughts and ideas].  I really
appreciate the fact that list members don't want to clutter each other's
email boxes with responses to individual group member's questions that are
specific to the requesting person's own work.  On the other hand, some on
this list may want to read the responses b/c it helps them think about these
issues in light of developing their own studies.

How do you feel about this issue?  Do you think we should  circulate answers
to individual's questions via the list or just reply privately.

B/c this is one of those "administrative" questions - feel free to reply to
me privately and I'll collect the responses and let all know the result. 

Thanks!

Andi
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