Welcome to The Zen of Program-Level Student Learning Outcomes part of The Student Learning Outcomes Assessment Cycle (SLOAC) Project El Camino College

The Big Picture Program vision, mission, and goals Community expectations and needs El Camino College institutional mission, vision and goals Student expectations, needs and goals Related professional expectations Course SLOs Overlapping Course SLOs become Program SLOs Course SLOs Program SLOs and Assessments are caught in the middle!

Course Level SLOs Program Level SLOs Course SLOs Overlapping Course SLOs become Program SLOs Course SLOs

Part I: Program Goals Program Level SLOs

Example: Respite Women’s and Children’s Shelter Mission Statement To provide safety and shelter to women and children who are victims of domestic violence through crisis intervention, therapeutics and education, and to reduce societal violence against women and children. Individual Work: Spend three minutes writing a draft of an outcome for the Shelter that reflects their mission statement. Continued funding is based on evidence that the shelter is meeting its purported outcomes.

Example: Respite Women’s and Children’s Shelter Mission Statement To provide safety and shelter to women and children who are victims of domestic violence through crisis intervention, therapeutics and education, and to reduce societal violence against women and children. After consultation among the shelter’s board of directors, staff and clients, the following outcome was proposed: Actual Outcome: Following the services and therapeutics of the women’s shelter, battered women will make a choice to leave their violent relationships as a major strategy to protect themselves and their children.

Example: Respite Women’s and Children’s Shelter Some Questions: 1.Has their been consultation among the stakeholders? 2.Does the outcome focus on what women can do following the program? Does the outcome define an action women can take? 3.Is this outcome measurable? 4.Is this outcome valid and appropriate for the shelter? 5.Is this outcome understandable to the intended audience?

Working with your own program Task 1: On your Program Goals and Program- Level SLOs handout, name and briefly describe your program in one sentence that contains the following information: who you are what you do for whom and why Example: Pre-Allied Health Biology Program The pre-allied health biology program prepares students for vocational health programs by providing rigorous courses and hands-on experiences in human biology.

Working with your own program Task 2: Describe one student-centered goal of your program. Example: Pre-Allied Health Biology Program Goal: Students leaving our program will possess the content knowledge of human anatomy necessary to succeed in vocational healthcare training.

Working with your own program Task 3: Exchange your paper with another group nearby. Task 4: Review the description of the program and the student-centered goal of the paper you received. Example: (Do you really need an example for these two tasks?)

Working with your own program Task 5: Answer to the best of your ability the following question. Be as specific as possible: “As a well-educated skeptic, what sorts of evidence would you need to see before you would be convinced that students in the program have attained the stated student-centered goal?” Example: Pre-Allied Health Biology Program Direct Measure: Student Portfolios containing results from hands-on summative assessments. Indirect Measure: Success rates of former students in local healthcare vocational training programs.

Working with your own program Task 6: Pass the paper back to the original owners. Task 7: Review the recommendations for the types of evidence needed to show that your students have attained your student- centered goal. Example: (Again, do you really need an example for these two tasks?)

Working with your own program Task 8: Write a Program Level SLO that measures how well your students attain your student-centered goal. Use the questions on the next slide to guide you (these are also on your handout):

Working with your own program Guiding questions: Does the outcome focus on what students can do? Does the outcome address more than one domain (knowledge, skills, attitudes)? Does the outcome emphasize the “big picture”? Does the outcome suggest a context and appropriate manner in which it may be assessed? Does the outcome have value for the student, the faculty, the school?

Working with your own program Task 9: Record the following information on one of the half sheets of paper provided: The name of your program The name and of a contact person for your program The one-sentence description of your program The draft of the SLO you wrote The example of a direct measure and an indirect measure Once you have recorded all of this, carefully separate the white sheet from the yellow. Keep the yellow sheet and hand in the white copy.

Part 2: College Level Core Competencies Program Level SLOs

A working, incomplete list of Core Competencies (Institutional Level Student Learning Outcomes): Critical Thinking Community and Collaboration Communication and Comprehension

Working with your own program Task 1: On your Core Competencies handout, list the key courses in your program in the column on the left-hand side of the table. If there is not enough room, deal with it imaginatively. Task 2: For each course, briefly describe how the goals of the course might contribute to student attainment of each of the three core competencies. Be as specific as possible in the spaced provided.

Working with your own program Task 3: Looking at the results of Task 2, which of the three core competencies does your program best support? Task 4: Draft a Program-Level SLO related to the core competency you selected in Task 3. Again, use the questions on the next slide and on your handout to guide you.

Working with your own program Guiding questions: Does the outcome focus on what students can do? Does the outcome address more than one domain (knowledge, skills, attitudes)? Does the outcome emphasize the “big picture”? Does the outcome suggest a context and appropriate manner in which it may be assessed? Does the outcome have value for the student, the faculty, the school?

Working with your own program Task 5: Record the following information on one of the half sheets of paper provided: The name of your program The core competency you selected The draft of the SLO you wrote The possible direct and indirect measures for assessment Once you have recorded all of this, carefully separate the white sheet from the yellow. Keep the yellow sheet and hand in the white copy.

Resources Assessing Student Learning, Section 6, of the online SLO tutorial at Bakersfield College: There is a link for this site at the El Camino College SLO Website: