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• Campus Definition
• Why do I  need to do assessment

Campus Definition

The Program Assessment Resource Team, a group of 10 faculty supported by the Bush Grant in OID and trained to conduct faculty development in assessment on UND’s campus, discussed what they considered to be important elements of assessment and constructed the following working definition of assessment for UND:

Assessment is a process by which information from multiple sources is gathered and critically examined to better understand what our students are learning in relation to stated learning goals. Effective assessment results in “informed decision-making” – documenting assessment activities with clarity and in a way that demonstrates continuity and consistency, and using the results of assessment to improve student learning.

Key words in the definition communicate principles of “good assessment”:

Process – assessment is an ongoing activity that brings added value rather than a periodic or episodic activity that occurs only at times when we’re held accountable, such as re-accreditation visits.

Information from multiple sources – when we collect data about what our students are learning we are using multiple methods to do it, so that from a number of different perspectives we can understand the whole picture. As we select assessment methods that are appropriate to assessing individual student learning goals, we strive for a balance between what we consider indirect methods (methods that provide information about student’s perceptions about what they have learned such as surveys, questionnaires, interviews or other studies such as transcript analyses, graduation rates, job placement, employer surveys, etc.) and direct methods (methods that provide information about what students have learned that come directly from their work such as course exams, creative performances, presentations, papers, nationally-normed exams, portfolios, etc.). Assessment methods can yield quantitative or qualitative information, either equally valid in helping us understand what our students are learning.

Critical examination – Data doesn’t get put in drawer or file cabinet, but time is set aside for faculty to analyze data and draw conclusions.

Stated learning goals – when our program goals are stated as learning outcomes, i.e., what our students should know or be able to do, they are the foundation for the design and implementation of an effective assessment plan.

Informed decision-making – Conclusions we draw from our assessment results help us as faculty make educationally sound decisions about program/curricular improvement.

Documenting assessment activities – In order to effectively use data and to keep track of improvement decisions, it is essential to be building a “body of evidence” that supports our work in assessing student learning. Notebooks, files, or portfolios kept in the department allow data, information and a record of improvements to be accessible as your work is ongoing. Good record-keeping is also essential when we are asked to provide specifics such as during program review or accreditation visits.

Clarity, continuity, consistency – The ongoing nature of assessment, whose purpose, results and use of results are clearly communicated, becomes the foundation of a campus culture that promotes continuous improvement.

Improving student learning – As educators, our ultimate goal. Effective assessment practices give us information that provides direction and priorities in decision making.

Why do I need to do assessment?

We’ve heard a lot about assessment these days. If you are part of a program that is separately accredited, your accrediting body is likely focusing not only on resources to deliver the program but your employment of appropriate assessment measures that generate data on program effectiveness. UND’s accrediting body, the Higher Learning Commission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools, states that “[A university’s] commitment to and capacity for effective assessment…will figure more prominently than ever in the accreditation relationship established between the Commission and that [university].” Statements like this are, of course, not trivial; they promote conversation and action that become an important part of the fabric of our campus community. But what do they mean when they use the term “assessment”? We’re told this is an important part of what we should be doing, even that we should want to be doing it, but many of us are having a difficult time perceiving a concrete contextual relevance with regard to how we should be thinking about this. How should we be defining “assessment” so that we all know what it is we are talking about?

The Higher Learning Commission consistently uses the term “assessment” in the context of student learning or student academic achievement and rightly so. Very simply, assessment activities are those that we as faculty design to answer this question: How do we know that our students are learning what we have stated we would like them to learn?

Implicit in this key question are the following elements:

• Assessment is a faculty activity.

• Assessment is driven by student learning goals that are clear, concise and stated at the outset of the educational experience.

• Assessment employs a method appropriate to our stated goals and teaching methods by which we learn something about what our student’s are learning that we didn’t know before – it is research based directly on our teaching.

• The principle of “knowing” as an outcome of our research based on our teaching requires documentation and dissemination.

The natural follow-up question is: What should be the result of answering the question “How do we know that our students are learning what we have stated we would like them to learn?” – in essence, why ask the question in the first place? What’s our ultimate goal? The Higher Learning Commission is right to focus on assessment in the context of student learning because any campus that places student learning at the center of its educational endeavors must understand that the answer to that question provides the key to improving student learning. Employing methods to answer the “student learning question” has the power to affirm achievement of our student learning goals and also show us where opportunities exist for improvement or change.

Take a moment to think about it. After all, as a faculty member, teaching students comprises a significant, if not major, part of your responsibility on this campus. At the end of a semester we are always thinking about how to improve our course because of how things went during the semester. Much of our thinking and planning is on the basis of perceptions we have, but also on meaningful data we have collected – much of it directly related to student learning.

So, to a degree, we’re engaged in these activities already – in the context of our individual classrooms or more broadly in our academic programs. Formalizing our assessment activities, i.e., writing and submitting assessment plans, including information about our assessment activities in annual reports, program reviews, course revalidations, etc., makes important statements about us, such as:

• As educators, we are intentional about how we engage in teaching and learning.

• We place student learning at the center of our educational endeavors.

• We desire to make sound, evidence-based decisions about our classroom teaching, program curricula, strategic planning and allocation of resources.

• We have a responsibility to share our successes and also what we have learned from opportunities to improve with our UND colleagues as well as peers at other institutions.

The Program Assessment Resource Team, a group of 10 faculty supported by the Bush Grant in OID and trained to conduct faculty development in assessment on UND’s campus, discussed what they considered to be important elements of assessment and constructed the following working definition of assessment for UND:

Assessment is a process by which information from multiple sources is gathered and critically examined to better understand what our students are learning in relation to stated learning goals. Effective assessment results in “informed decision-making” – documenting assessment activities with clarity and in a way that demonstrates continuity and consistency, and using the results of assessment to improve student learning.

An up-to-date program assessment plan is a “roadmap” that guides the alignment of your program’s mission, your student learning goals, assessment methods, and decision-making about program improvement, all with the intent of helping us come to a common understanding of assessment and move toward a “culture of practice” that reflects that, on UND’s campus, assessment is a natural outgrowth of our teaching.