Carolinda Douglass
by Mark McGowan
With so many parties holding universities accountable, from students to parents to employers to taxpayers to lawmakers, the importance of measuring success is paramount.
Few use the same tools or ask the same questions, however. Or, as geography professor David Changnon said, “assessment is something most of us weren’t trying to do.”
On the last day of classes before Spring Break, around three dozen faculty and staff gathered for NIU’s first assessment expo. Designed to highlight successful assessment practices on campus, the event included posters and a panel of speakers from departments across campus who shared their experiences with assessment.
“What really inspired us was to promote a more positive aspect of assessment – for people to be able to see good practices in assessment and to be able to borrow some of those practices for their own assessment,” said Carolinda Douglass, director of Assessment Services at NIU.
“This was a good start to holding more expos that will demonstrate the kinds of good practices people are doing.”
Virginia Cassidy, vice provost for academic development and planning, opened the expo by calling it an opportunity to learn from each other, to reflect on what’s happening on campus and to work collaboratively.
Some of the assessment models lauded at national conferences do not measure up to some of NIU’s work in that area, she said.
Posters outlined assessment tools for:
Panelists included Penny McIntire from the Department of Computer Science, Andrea Evans from the Department of Leadership, Educational Psychology and Foundations, Jinsook Kim from the School of Nursing and Health Studies and Changnon.
The work of assessment is complex and incredibly fluid, panelists said, and requires not only constant analysis and occasional revision of the tools but stability from year to year and in the rubrics used for good comparisons.
“Just because you’re trying to measure something doesn’t mean it’s going to be successful,” Evans said.
Evans addressed an assessment tool in her department that determines a degree candidate’s ability to support student learning and/or impact the learning environment.
Conducted during clinical internships, candidates collect and analyze school and/or district data, communicate the results of the analysis to relevant stakeholders, develop a plan using the data and revise and implement a program, policy or process that affects student learning or the learning environment.
Faculty in computer science appreciate assessment comments from employers, McIntire said, especially comments that demonstrate the learning abilities of the department’s graduates and internship students. “We can’t teach every technique,” she said.
Such external reviews sometimes can provide the department with a better picture of what students are capable of, McIntire added.
“I don’t think (students) know yet how much they know,” she said.
Changnon said he and his colleagues in the Department of Geography have learned a few things traversing the “long and winding road” of assessment. It’s an enhancing and enriching process. It reveals something more than what the final grade indicates. It need not measure everything all the time.
But among the good questions to ask, according to Changnon: Was there growth?
Three departments were awarded $500 each to spend on future assessment endeavors: the Department of Geography, the Department of Philosophy and the School of Nursing and Health Studies.
Ten departments, including the three award winners, received certificates acknowledging their outstanding assessment efforts.
The others include Business Administration; the Department of Computer Science; the Department of Economics; the Department of Leadership, Educational Psychology and Foundations; the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures; the Department of Kinesiology and Physical Education; and the School of Family, Consumer and Nutrition Sciences.
Another assessment expo is being planned for next spring, Douglass said.