1. Student Learning Outcomes (SLO) and Assessment

2. Why?
As part of the SACS reaffirmation process, we must demonstrate that all courses and programs have defined student learning outcomes (SLO), assessment of SLO, and evidence of using assessment results to improve programs.
The SLO and mode of assessment must be included within each syllabus of every section, for every course offered.

3. What are Student Learning Outcomes?
During reaffirmation, SACS will consider whether courses are “results-oriented”
SLO have three distinguishing characteristics:
observable
measurable
achievable in one semester
The SLO must convey to the student the information they will learn/apply during the semester.

4. What SLO are not The following are NOT examples of SLO:
What an institution does (e.g. increased enrollment, maintains a balanced budget)
What an instructor does (e.g. covers the history of the Civil War)
Indicators of student learning (e.g. grades, degrees)
Benefits/consequences of student learning (e.g. job placement, transfer, student satisfaction)

5. How? SLO = Action verb + topic + standard of success
Most often, SLOs are activities that students are already doing for grades; you may just need to re-word course objectives and define assessment methods to be able to measure them
SLOs should consist of action verbs that define a level of learning within that particular outcome (see
Include intended SLOs in all sections’ syllabi

6. Course objectives v. Course SLO’s
Course objectives are:
Broad or global in scope
Concise – more than two, less than ten
Collective – sets of learning goals with commonalities
Student Learning Outcomes are:
Narrow and specific in scope
Profuse – billions of possibilities
Discrete or individual learning goals

7. When? SACS requires a four semester history of syllabi showing SLOs
Every faculty member must electronically submit via their departmental curriculum committee a syllabus for each class they are teaching, for each of the following semesters:
Fall 2006
Spring 2007
Fall 2007, and
Spring 2008
Mention that is faculty are using different syllabi for each section, the syllabus used by particular faculty member must be available electronically.
Is submission through the departmental curriculum committee the most effective method to collect?

8. General Education Courses
SLOs approved during the recertification of general education courses in 2001 must be utilized
All general education courses must include approved SLOs in syllabi for each section
Assessment must be linked to SLO’s

9. Syllabus Content Required by SACS
SLO (see examples on following slides)
Defined assessment methods that are directly linked to the SLOs and used to evaluate student achievement of the SLO
The content and goals of the course should be consistent with the departmental mission

10. Components of a Written Course SLO
Context that describes the conditions for demonstration of learning
Action verb that states what a successful student will be able to do
Specific topic or unit of content derived from the course objective
Success standard that defines achievement of the learning goal
Method of assessment that provides evidence of achievement of the learning goal

11. Sample SLO GLY 155 (currently defined as objectives)
Upon completion of this course, the students are expected to have the following expertise:
An understanding of the concepts of geology and the applicability of these concepts to the geologic setting of this area
An appreciation of the concept of geologic time and how the local geology reflects the geologic history of this of the region.
A knowledge of the way that geologic conditions and geologic processes have influenced social and economic development of this area
Improved observational abilities with respect to appreciation of the local geologic environment.
These defined objectives for the General Education Geology course can be easily transformed into student learning outcomes – they already use action verbs that measure a student’s progress!

12. Sample SLO CMGT 101 (currently defined as objectives)
At the conclusion of CMGT 101, each student will be able to:
Interpret and comprehend construction blueprints for residential, commercial, and highway construction projects.
Communicate an understanding of construction systems by demonstrating the ability to correctly sketch and draw construction systems and components.
Locate and apply industry standard reference materials to determine appropriate materials and installation methods.
Explain the permit procedures including building and zoning code requirements.
List the responsibility of and the relationship between the owners, architects, engineers, construction managers, contractors, and specialty contractors.
List the advantages and disadvantages of the different project delivery systems.

13. Sample SLO PSY 360 (currently defined as objectives)
To identify sites of drug action in the brain (e.g., neurotransmitters, receptors, transporters, enzymes).
To recognize the clinical effects and side effects of antianxiety, antidepressant, and antipsychotic drugs.
To better understand the biological basis of drug abuse and addiction.
To appreciate how biological changes produced by drugs of abuse relate to behavioral responses to drugs and to drug-seeking behavior
Prepare individuals to better understand and appraise current primary literature in the field of psychopharmacology.

14. Sample SLO
PAD 626 (Graduate Research Methods/Program Evaluation course)
Increase knowledge of evaluation rationale, theories, concepts and processes;
Learn and practice techniques related to evaluation logic, design, data collection and analysis;
Demonstrate insight to key issues and challenges associated with nonprofit program evaluation
Enhance ability to analyze evaluation settings and to communicate findings effectively – both in written papers and in oral presentations

15. After I’ve defined my SLO, what else does SACS want?
3.3.1 The institution identifies expected outcomes for its educational programs and its administrative and educational support services; assesses whether it achieves these outcomes; and provides evidence of improvement based on analysis of those results.
3.4.1 The institution demonstrates that each educational program for which academic credit is awarded
(a) is approved by the faculty and the administration, and
(b) establishes and evaluates program and learning outcomes.

16. Assessment?
“A systematic process of looking at student achievement within and across courses by gathering, interpreting and using information about student learning for educational improvement.”
1.State legislatures, taxpayers, students and their parents, accrediting agencies, national task forces, and private industry have all been pressuring postsecondary institutions to demonstrate that they are providing high quality education. (Halpern)
“Assessment should enhance the public perception of, and support for, postsecondary education and the diversity of institutional roles and missions.”2
The present demand for accountability in higher education requires that the nation’s colleges and universities demonstrate that they are providing promised results in an efficient and effective manner.(Sims) Taxpayers are looking for ways to educate the public at the lowest possible cost.
Assessment is not new. But as financial constraints have tightened, legislators and other responsible for providing public higher education with resources have become anxious to have evidence of the return on their investment.(Ewell)
2. Outcomes Assessment can help identify problems within a particular curricula. It can establish a need for increasing the emphasis of particular skills areas in the curriculum. It can tell you whether or not your students are learning what you want them to learn.
Outcomes assessment can help faculty evaluate teaching practices to address issues like the increasing numbers and diversity of students; stakeholder emphasis on value-added education; legislative desire for a productive, competitive workforce; increasing time to degree and so on.
3. Assessment results can be used to improve retention and recruitment as well as service and support areas on campus.
All of these are good reasons to utilize assessment, but most importantly, assessment can help to focus institutional attention on the most critical activities, teaching and learning.(Ewell)
The process of assessment requires that you think about
What it is you are trying to teach?
How are you teaching it?
How will you know students have learned it?
What evidence did you find that students are learning it?
What is it you believe you are doing right?
What problems exist in your program?
What actions will you take to improve student learning?
The point of assessment is not to get good news but to improve student learning. Assessment should be viewed as an opportunity not a burden. Assessment results can help support request for resources, facilities, and personnel.
We need to understand, however, that assessment is a complex process requiring multiple methods of data collection and careful analysis.
American Association of Higher Education Bulletin

17. Five Themes of Assessment
Assessment should focus on improving student learning;
The focus of assessment should not be limited to the classroom, but include the wide range of processes that influence learning;
Assessment is a process embedded within larger systems;
Assessment should focus collective attention and create linkages and enhance coherence within and across the curriculum; and
Tension between assessment for improvement and assessment for accountability must be managed.
Characteristics of good assessment are:
comprehensive, ongoing and evolutionary
broad involvement from faculty
clear, assessable educational goals and objectives
uses a variety of assessment and evaluation methodologies
collects meaningful and accurate data
primary emphasis is on improvement of teaching and learning
(adapted from Seybert, 1998)

18. Why aren’t grades enough?
Grading practices are not standardized
Need for different ways of structuring program assessment
Grades reflect several variables other than course content and mastery
Objectives and outcomes differ across departments and programs
Good assessment incorporates multiple ways of measuring goal achievement
1. An A in one section of a course may not mean the same as an A in another section of the same course. Grades in one course may be assigned on a different basis than those in another. How many students can’t read, write or do math at a college level when they entered? But all these students graduated from high school with a passing grade.
2. Grades are not systematic. A student who is a good writer or a good test taker, good at memorizing or good at analysis, will fare differently in different courses, and the grade distributions in classes that allow relearning will be different from those in classes that do not allow relearning.
3. For example, grades reflect participation variables like discussion, cooperation, attendance, verbal ability, which do not reflect course content and mastery.
4. How is an individual student’s grade used to improve the department overall? The point is not to judge the students but to judge the program. We need to look carefully at GROUPS of students to see what they tell us about how to enrich teaching and improve the curriculum.
5. Grades are only a limited piece of a complete assessment process. Grades won’t tell you anything about what students aren’t learning but need to know. Assessment should use multiple measures, both qualitative as well as quantitative, rather than relying on one instrument or activity.

19. How? Connect SLO to exams and assignments to measure performance by:
Creating assessment instruments that incorporate assignments, presentations, projects essays, performances and exams you are already using
Utilizing rubrics - see rubric example slide 18
Reporting and evaluating assessment instruments - see rubric example slide 19
Defining assessment plan statements – see example slide 20
Close the loop by:
Comparing data across semesters to find strengths/weaknesses in different SLO areas - see example slide 21

20. Sample Assessment Rubric (written communication skills)
Performance Area
Rating = 4
Rating = 3
Rating = 2
Rating = 1
Score
Structure
Clear and appropriate beginning, development, conclusion
Adequate beginning, development and conclusion
Weak beginning, development and conclusion; paragraphing is deficient
Organizational structure and paragraphing have serious errors
Content
In-depth coverage of the topic and assertions are supported
Sufficient coverage of the topic and assertions are supported
Inadequate coverage of the assigned topic and assertions are weakly supported
Work does not cover the assigned topic; assertions not supported
Mechanics
No major errors in word selection and use, spelling, punctuation, etc.
Work is relatively free of errors in word selection and use, etc.
Work has major errors in word selection and use, etc.
Work has serious and persistent errors in word selection and use, etc.

21. Report your Assessment Findings*
Assessment Criteria/Performance Standards/Expected Result(s):
i.e.: Less than 30% of students will answer each embedded question correctly on the pretest, whereas 80% or more will answer each embedded question correctly on the final exam
Statement of Actual Results:
i.e.: Expected results were met
Problems Encountered:
(if minimum standards were not met)
Actions Taken/Recommendations for Further Action:
i.e. curricular changes or improvements
*Complete this for each assessment criteria statement.

22. Define your Assessment Plan Statement (i.e. SOC 201)
Intended Outcome #1
i.e. Students enrolled in sophomore SOC will demonstrate an understanding of key sociological concepts and principles.
Assessment Measures, Techniques and Target Courses/Activities
i.e. SOC 201 students will complete a pretest and final examination, in which questions related to key sociological concepts and principles are embedded. Faculty will evaluate student performance across all sections.
Assessment Criteria/Expected Results
i.e. Less than 30% of students will answer each embedded question correctly on the pretest, whereas 80% will answer correctly on the final exam.

23. Close the loop Ask four questions:
What do you expect your students to know at the beginning of the semester?
What do you expect your students to have learned by the end of the semester?
Did the students meet your expectations?
What can be done to change the course so that students can better meet/exceed your expectations next semester?
Compare findings across sections of courses and communicate them to create win-win situations for students, faculty, and departments
Utilize the reports of assessment findings to develop budget priorities, update the department’s strategic plan and/or program review document, and create an annual assessment plan for the following year.

24. What if you do not have assessable goals?
Examine the set of required courses.
Ask, “What have we been trying to teach?” (SLO)
Ask, “What should students know before they enter the curriculum in order to succeed?’ (Entrance Criteria)
Ask, “What should students know when they complete the curriculum in order to graduate?” (Exit Criteria)
Ask, “At what points in the curriculum are students doing well or having difficulty?” (Midpoint Criteria)
Ask, “Are our alumni successful in the field?” (Post Completion Criteria)
1. Examine the set of required courses.
2. Ask, “What have we been trying to teach?” (Outcomes)
Content knowledge?
Cognitive skills?
Values and attitudes?
3. Ask, “What should students know before they enter the curriculum in order to succeed?’ (Entrance Criteria)
4. Ask, “What should students know when they complete the curriculum in order to graduate?” (Exit Criteria)
5. Ask, “At what points in the curriculum are students doing well or having difficulty?” (Midpoint Criteria)
6. Ask, “Are our alumni successful in the field?” (Post Completion Criteria)
Adapted from NCTLA
Adapted from NCTLA

25. 9 Best Practices for Assessing Student Learning
The assessment of student learning begins with educational values.
Assessment is most effective when it reflects an understanding of learning as multidimensional, integrated, and revealed in performance over time.
Assessment works best when the programs it seeks to improve have clear, explicitly stated purposes.
Assessment requires attention to outcomes but also and equally to the experiences that lead to those outcomes.
Assessment works best when it is ongoing not episodic.
Assessment fosters wider improvement when representatives from across the educational community are involved.
Assessment makes a difference when it begins with issues of use and illuminates questions that people really care about.
Assessment is most likely to lead to improvement when it is part of a larger set of conditions that promote change.
Through assessment, educators meet responsibilities to students and to the public.
9 Principles of Good Practice for Assessing Student Learning
1. The assessment of student learning begins with educational values.
Assessment is not an end in itself but a vehicle for educational improvement. Its effective practice, then, begins with and enacts a vision of the kinds of learning we most value for students and strive to help them achieve. Educational values should drive not only what we choose to assess but also how we do so. Where questions about educational mission and values are skipped over, assessment threatens to be an exercise in measuring what's easy, rather than a process of improving what we really care about.
2. Assessment is most effective when it reflects an understanding of learning as multidimensional, integrated, and revealed in performance over time.
Learning is a complex process. It entails not only what students know but what they can do with what they know; it involves not only knowledge and abilities but values, attitudes, and habits of mind that affect both academic success and performance beyond the classroom. Assessment should reflect these understandings by employing a diverse array of methods, including those that call for actual performance, using them over time so as to reveal change, growth, and increasing degrees of integration. Such an approach aims for a more complete and accurate picture of learning, and therefore firmer bases for improving our students' educational experience.
3. Assessment works best when the programs it seeks to improve have clear, explicitly stated purposes.
Assessment is a goal-oriented process. It entails comparing educational performance with educational purposes and expectations --those derived from the institution's mission, from faculty intentions in program and course design, and from knowledge of students' own goals. Where program purposes lack specificity or agreement, assessment as a process pushes a campus toward clarity about where to aim and what standards to apply; assessment also prompts attention to where and how program goals will be taught and learned. Clear, shared, implemental goals are the cornerstone for assessment that is focused and useful.
4. Assessment requires attention to outcomes but also and equally to the experiences that lead to those outcomes.
Information about outcomes is of high importance; where students "end up" matters greatly. But to improve outcomes, we need to know about student experience along the way -- about the curricula, teaching, and kind of student effort that lead to particular outcomes. Assessment can help us understand which students learn best under what conditions; with such knowledge comes the capacity to improve the whole of their learning.
5. Assessment works best when it is ongoing not episodic.
Assessment is a process whose power is cumulative. Though isolated, "one-shot" assessment can be better than none, improvement is best fostered when assessment entails a linked series of activities undertaken over time. This may mean tracking the process of individual students, or of cohorts of students; it may mean collecting the same examples of student performance or using the same instrument semester after semester. The point is to monitor progress toward intended goals in a spirit of continuous improvement. Along the way, the assessment process itself should be evaluated and refined in light of emerging insights.
6. Assessment fosters wider improvement when representatives from across the educational community are involved.
Student learning is a campus-wide responsibility, and assessment is a way of enacting that responsibility. Thus, while assessment efforts may start small, the aim over time is to involve people from across the educational community. Faculty play an especially important role, but assessment's questions can't be fully addressed without participation by student- affairs educators, librarians, administrators, and students. Assessment may also involve individuals from beyond the campus (alumni/ae, trustees, employers) whose experience can enrich the sense of appropriate aims and standards for learning. Thus understood, assessment is not a task for small groups of experts but a collaborative activity; its aim is wider, better-informed attention to student learning by all parties with a stake in its improvement.
7. Assessment makes a difference when it begins with issues of use and illuminates questions that people really care about.
Assessment recognizes the value of information in the process of improvement. But to be useful, information must be connected to issues or questions that people really care about. This implies assessment approaches that produce evidence that relevant parties will find credible, suggestive, and applicable to decisions that need to be made. It means thinking in advance about how the information will be used, and by whom. The point of assessment is not to gather data and return "results"; it is a process that starts with the questions of decision-makers, that involves them in the gathering and interpreting of data, and that informs and helps guide continuous improvement.
8. Assessment is most likely to lead to improvement when it is part of a larger set of conditions that promote change.
Assessment alone changes little. Its greatest contribution comes on campuses where the quality of teaching and learning is visibly valued and worked at. On such campuses, the push to improve educational performance is a visible and primary goal of leadership; improving the quality of undergraduate education is central to the institution's planning, budgeting, and personnel decisions. On such campuses, information about learning outcomes is seen as an integral part of decision-making, and avidly sought.
9. Through assessment, educators meet responsibilities to students and to the public.
There is a compelling public stake in education. As educators, we have a responsibility to the publics that support or depend on us to provide information about the ways in which our students meet goals and expectations. But that responsibility goes beyond the reporting of such information; our deeper obligation -- to ourselves, our students, and society -- is to improve. Those to whom educators are accountable have a corresponding obligation to support such attempts at improvement.

26. Resources
Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) Principles of Accreditation. Approved by the College Delegate Assembly,
Kelley, L.H. (Ed.D) Assessment and Planning Resources; link found at , 2006.
Bloom, B. S. (Ed.) Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: The Classification of Educational Goals. Handbook I: Cognitive Domain. White Plains, NY: Longman, 1956.
Angelo, T.A. AAHE Bulletin. April 1995, p.11.
Angelo, T.A. AAHE Bulletin. November 1995, p.7.
Alexander W. Astin; Trudy W. Banta; K. Patricia Cross; Elaine El-Khawas; Peter T. Ewell; Pat Hutchings; Theodore J. Marchese; Kay M. McClenney; Marcia Mentkowski; Margaret A. Miller; E. Thomas Moran; Barbara D. Wright. This document was developed under the auspices of the AAHE Assessment Forum with support from the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education with additional support for publication and dissemination from the Exxon Education Foundation. Copies may be made without restriction.