March 13, 2012, 3:00pm Agenda
Provost's Conference Room - 239 Tigert hall

Timothy S. Brophy, Director of Institutional Assessment, Chair
Joanne Foss, Associate Dean for Student and Academic Affairs, PHHP, Co-Chair

1. Welcome

2. Approval of the February 14, 2012 meeting minutes

3. Discussion and approval: ALC Approval Guidelines - Mark Law, Anne Kendall Casella, David Pharies, included here:

       Guidelines for the Approval of ALCs

1. SLOs - In general, SLOs should be broad statements of student accomplishment. Since all must be assessed, it is preferable, in most cases, to have fewer of these rather than more. However, in units that have external accreditation requirements, SLOs should match those requirements, as appropriate, to simplify faculty workload. Since all SLOs must be assessed, they should address knowledge and skills that are assessable, and should be formulated with this factor in mind.


2. Assessment - All SLOs must be assessed by a measure specific to the outcome addressed. Assessments must either be based on a rubric (defined below) developed or approved by a group of faculty, or performed by a faculty committee. Course grades are appropriate to assess individual SLOs only under the following conditions: (1) the course grade focuses almost exclusively on a single SLO, (2) the course grade is based entirely on performance criteria rather than extraneous factors such as attendance, (3) performance is calibrated according to a faculty-approved rubric.


3. Data generated by assessment should be reviewed regularly and used for program improvement.

A rubric is a focused description of level of achievement and expectations of quality. It is designed to produce fair and consistent grading results among professors and from semester to semester.

4. Documenting Institutional Effectiveness for Colleges - Final Review

5. Discussion: Graduate Academic Assessment Plans

1. Mission
2. SLOs
3. Program Goals
4. Curriculum Maps
5. Assessment Cycles
6. Methods and Procedures
7. Assessment Oversight

Developing an Undergraduate Academic Assessment Plan (.pdf)
Assessment Maps for Graduate Programs (.pdf)
Sample Map for PhD in Music Education (.pdf)