RE: Assessment

During 1995-1996, the COD Student Outcomes Assessment Committee relied heavily on the experience of colleagues at Triton, Oakton, and Sinclair as it worked on a plan of action for COD. All three of these community colleges are one or more years ahead of COD in implementing student outcomes assessment, and they very graciously shared their experiences and expertise with the Committee so that we could incorporate their best ideas and avoid some of the pitfalls that they encountered as pioneers in this process.

Representatives from all three colleges will be at our Faculty Development Day: Jack Scanlon (English) from Triton; Bill Taylor(Political Science) and Sandra Wittman (Librarian) from Oakton; and Linda Denny (Computer Science) from Sinclair. They will be panel members at the town hall meeting and leaders of three of the breakout sessions after the town hall.

The Committee is very grateful to these guests for their participation and invites COD faculty to seek these people out for questions. Two or three years ago they faced many of the issues we are confronting now, and their experience can be invaluable to us.

Who Says There's No Free Lunch?

Come to Faculty Development Day and get a free lunch and a free breakfast, too! Be there.

Friday, November 1, SRC 2800.
College of DuPage Welcomes Dr. Jeff Seybert

College of DuPage is pleased to welcome Dr. Jeff Seybert, keynote speaker on the Faculty Development Day,

November 1, 1996. Dr. Seybert's address will explore the importance of assessing student academic outcomes and dispel some of the myths surrounding the process.

Jeff Seybert is currently Director of Research, Evaluation, and Instructional Development at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, Kansas. He has been in the Office of Institutional Research at JCCC for fifteen years. Prior to his appointment at JCCC, he served for seven years as assistant professor of psychology at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

Dr. Seybert holds degrees from Cal-State Long Beach, the University of Missouri-Kansas City, and a doctorate in experimental psychology from the University of Oklahoma.

In his work at JCCC, Dr. Seybert has coordinated the design and implementation of systematic program review processes for evaluation of instructional and support progrrams. He has also coordinated the design and implementation of college programs for assessment of institutional effectiveness and student learning outcomes.

Dr. Seybert has written and consulted extensively and is currently a consulting editor for Journal of Applied Research in the Community College, AIR Professional File, and Assessment Update.
Town Hall Meeting To Follow Keynote Address

Immediately following Dr. Jeff Seybert's keynote address, there will be a half hour town hall meeting during which questions can be directed to either Dr. Seybert or a panel composed of guest-experts from Triton, Oakton, and Sinclair and representatives from the COD Student Outcomes Assessment Committee.

This format was chosen so that comments or questions raised during the program could be asked and answered immediately and for the benefit of all participants. The Committee is anticipating a lively discussion, one in which anyone who wants to make a comment or ask a question will have an ample opportunity to do so.

Q. I know what a croissant is, but what's this croissant angelo I keep hearing about every time outcomes assessment is discussed?

A. That's "Cross and Angelo," not "croissant angelo"! K. Patricia Cross and Thomas A. Angelo are two of the leading gurus of the student outcomes assessment movement, and amongst devout converts, "Cross and Angelo" has become almost a mantra that is intoned frequently and reverently. Their names are linked because they are the co-authors of Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Handbook for College Teachers (San Francisco, Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1993), a widely used and highly influential text. Copies are available in the LRC and the Faculty Development Center.

Q. Although the terms "student outcomes assessment" and "classroom assessment techniques" are relatively new to me, I have come to the realization that these are things I've done in my classroom and with my colleagues at the departmental level for years. Why is there all this fuss with an in-service day and making some formal commitments to outcomes assessment?

A. First of all, you and your colleagues are to be commended for your efforts to improve the learning environment. That's what outcomes assessment is all about. The purpose of the in-service day is to make sure that all faculty members have a basic understanding of outcomes assessment, and the Committee believes that even those with long experience in outcomes assessment will gain valuable new information from this experience.

Concerning the formal commitment to outcomes assessment, the College has been asked by its accrediting agency, the North Central Association, to document its efforts relating to assessment. As an individual faculty member, you will never be asked to share the content of your classroom assessment, but you may be asked what technique(s) you used and how frequently. At the departmental level, you and your colleagues will be asked which multi-section courses you assessed and what conclusions you reached or what changes you instituted as a result of those assessments. It sounds as if you are doing many of these things already. All that the College is asking is that they be reported in a systematic fashion to create a paper trail for the NCA to examine and evaluate.

It is important that the College retain its excellent reputation with the NCA, but even more important is the postive impact this effort can have on students. If all faculty and all disciplines are involved cooperatively in outcomes assessment, it can't help but improve the learning environment for everyone

Assessment In Action: What Is A Rubric?

The dictionary defines a rubric as "an authoritative rule or direction," but for Dr. Nancy Conradt, Associate Professor of History, a rubric has taken on much more significance. Nancy first learned about rubrics last June, while she was attending the national Assessment Conference in Washington, D.C. Based on a concept called Primary Trait Analysis, a rubric is a document that an instructor creates for a specific assignment. It gives students very explicit instructions and includes grading criteria for five levels of performance, corresponding to A to F. Nancy was quite impressed when she and a number of other participants were given a rubric for a technology assignment and asked to grade a sample of student papers. Using the rubric guidelines, there was almost 100% agreement on which grades should be assigned to which papers.

Upon returning, Nancy decided to construct essay and definition exam rubrics for her History 102 class, despite some concerns about the significant effort required. By the second exam, she saw greatly improved student performance, and her grading was so much more efficient that the time she needed to create the rubrics was more than offset by the time saved in grading.

A rubric can help reduce the subjectivity in grading essays. For example, Nancy created the following rubric to address the problem of "off-topic" responses:

· A "C" essay may have some correct facts, but it doesn't directly address the question asked.

· A "B" essay addresses the question asked and provides adequate factual support.

· An "A" essay completely addresses the question with a full range of factual material drawn from lectures, text, and films.

For each grade level she also included criteria relating to grammar, spelling, and other considerations related to good writing.

This quarter Nancy is using rubrics for almost all of her assignments, and she reports some significant benefits:

· Students are performing significantly better on exams than in previous quarters.

· Grading is less time-consuming because Nancy can attach the grading criteria right to the exam and circle criteria that have not been met.

· There are far fewer disputes about grades. When there is a challenge, Nancy can point out exactlywhat expectation has not been met, and the student seems to accept the grade much more readily.

· Students are asking, and in some casesalmost demanding, that rubrics accompany the assignments. They feel much more engaged and in control when they have a very specific set of criteria to work from.

Nancy admits that she was a bit skeptical about student outcomes assessment before she went to the conference, but what she learned is that much of it has to do with improving communications between instructor and students, and in her experience just applying one technique such as rubrics has made a profound impact on her classroom.

Copyright © 1998 College of DuPage
Students' Outcomes Assessment Committee  · (630)-942-2081
outcomes@cdnet.cod.edu
Updated December 16, 1999
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