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In an interview with New York Times Education Life writer Tamar Lewin, the noted astronomer David Helfand discusses dramatic innovations in undergraduate education he's helping to implement at Quest University Canada. Blocks replace semesters; one class at a time; 20 students in each class. Tutors replace professors. No departments. No tenure. He claims it's working to reinvigorate undergraduate education. Good ideas that ought to be tried elsewhere, or not ready for prime time?
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In "Assessment Changes Everything," Gerald Graff enters the controversy about mandates for "learning outcomes assessment," an innovation many humanities faculty see as worrisome, as the reactions to the essay (also included there) show. Gregory Jay adds a comment below.
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| Photo by William Thompson |
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I've actually been knee-deep in this debate at my own university during my now-four-year tenure on the university's Academic Program and Curriculum Committee (where I chair the subcommittee on general education) and as a member of our campus Reaccreditation Task Force, which is charged with coordinating the university's next reaccreditation by the Higher Learning Commission (the HLC). My experience validates many of your observations, but I have found the resistance to outcomes assessment takes less an ideological route (such as that of Bennett, who you cite) than a practical one, especially in reference to the humanities.
ReplyDeleteThe pressure to do outcomes assessment, in our case, is driven by the reaccreditation process, which now demands this data. Here in Wisconsin it is also driven by the University of Wisconsin's decision to adopt (with modification) the Essential Learning Outcomes articulated by the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U). Every department must now produce outcomes assessment for its program and enter this data (whether statistical or narrative or a combination) into a campus-wide computer program that stores the information and makes it available for reaccreditation purposes.
What's this like in practice? Departments and their faculty have the authority to determine outcomes, stipulate rubrics, choose measures, and shape reporting formats. For faculty in the humanities, where assessment has largely been the giving of grades and the writing of comments on student papers, there IS a steep learning curve when adopting and adapting these mandates. A learning outcome needs to be more specific than "critical thinking," at least at the program level. For example, it might be: "The student will be able to analyze the particular elements of an author's style and its relation to genre and tradition." Then we need a measure, which in this case would be a close-reading assignment (described on the syllabus as approved by the university curriculum committee). Then we need a measure or rubric: "The student identified accurately the stylistic devices used by the author, and was able to discuss the significance of the text's use of generic conventions." Sometimes the measurement is as simple as yes or no, and the data reported as general as "78% of students met the rubric standard successfully." The department is also to report back on steps taken when the numbers indicate problems with student outcomes. Departments are not expected to measure outcomes in every course every semester, but to track key outcomes in representative courses over a period of years.
Once the howling and protesting die down, faculty and departments have found, as you suggest, that this process can be useful and informative for everyone. It does help departments focus on articulating what their programs aim to do for students, often in much more detail than they have done before. It does communicate this to students, because it is on the syllabus, though quite often students don't read the syllabus or understand what they are being told. Faculty are prompted to make their assignment expectations clear and to be intentional in the design of assignments. And outcomes tend to get reinforced across a number of classes in the department.
While all of this represents more change than overworked humanities faculty wish for, I think it will ultimately benefit us all.
I've had some of the experiences Greg's had at my institution as well, where we are rolling out new rubrics for course assessment across the college of arts and sciences. Departments at Loyola have been given the authority to determine their own discipline-specific outcomes, and we are requiring assessments of just a few courses per semester. I've heard a lot of the same complaints here that Jerry's article and Greg's comment retail, that assessment is just another needless bureaucratic hurdle thrown up by the administration, that we already assess our students with grades. But assessment can be beneficial in all the ways Jerry suggests it it's done in a way that doesn't just reproduce grades. But there's the rub. In my department I think we've come up with some very good rubrics (along the lines Greg department has, with, by the way, no coordination whatsoever). However, those implementing the actual assessment made it too easy for faculty to simply translate the grades they gave students into an assessment of their ability to perform relative to the rubric. Faculty were asked to simply rate 20% of the students in a class excellent, above average, average, or below average relative to two of eight rubrics. Nothing was to be included in the syllabus about assessment, and no specific assignments were to be developed to test students relative to the outcomes we were looking for. No portfolio of student work was required. The result was a very mediocre process, one that went through the motions of assessment but really just translated grades into assessment.
DeleteHere are the rubrics our English department developed. For actual assessment purposes, each instructor is required to assess 20% of his/her students based on two of these rubrics:
1. English majors will be able to perform close readings of literature and other kinds of texts, paying careful attention to textual detail.
2. English majors will be able to communicate their ideas clearly, in writing that employs appropriate word choice, diction, structure, and mechanics.
3. English majors will be able to create focused and well-supported arguments and analyses.
4. English majors, where applicable, will demonstrate their understanding of literary and cultural theories by incorporating them into their work in precise and effective ways.
5. English majors, where applicable, will demonstrate their ability to employ in their own creative works their understanding of the conventions and techniques of particular literary genres.
6. English majors, where applicable, will demonstrate their knowledge of textual genres, histories, movements, traditions, and innovations.
7. English majors will demonstrate an understanding of how texts reflect and affect societies and cultures.
8. English majors will demonstrate an understanding of human diversity as it is represented in literature and other kinds of texts.