RATIONALE
On January 20, 2006, our campus received “Tips for Completing Plans
for Strengthened Campus Based Assessment” from GEAR (the General
Education Assessment Review Group). The following background to this
mandate was included as a preface to that document:
“Formed in January 2001, the General Education Assessment
Review Group (GEAR) is charged to provide ‘initial and ongoing
review’ for SUNY campuses’ general education (GE) assessment
plans. Beginning with the 2001-02 academic year, GEAR started its
review of campuses’ original GE assessment plans, as part of the
process referred to as “campus-based assessment.” All 57 SUNY
campuses with GE programs now have GEAR-approved campus-
based assessment plans in place, and many have completed one
full cycle of GE assessment (i.e., they have collected assessment
data on all 12 student learning outcome areas included in the
SUNY GE Requirement).
In June 2004, the SUNY Board of Trustees passed a resolution
requiring changes in SUNY-wide GE assessment, resulting in a
process that is referred to as ‘strengthened campus-based
assessment,’ or SCBA. Under this process, campuses are expected
to use externally-referenced measures of their choice to assess
three learning outcome areas: Mathematics, Critical Thinking
[Reasoning], and Basic Communication [Written]. Institutions are
also expected to assess students’ perceptions of the campus’
academic environment, more specifically, students’ engagement in
academic activities. During the Fall 2004 semester, GEAR revised
its existing guidelines for campus-based GE assessment to
incorporate the provisions in the Board of Trustees’ June 2004
resolution on SCBA. University Provost Peter D. Salins approved
these revised guidelines in February 2005 and sent them to
campuses, asking them to change their existing GE assessment
plans according to these new guidelines and submit their SCBA
assessment plans to his office. These plans are due to Provost
Salins’ office by February 15, 2006.”
The SCBA Timeline and the University at Albany Campus Response
GEAR convened a “kick off conference” for SCBA April 27-28, 2005 in
Syracuse. At that conference the discipline-based panels on Writing,
Critical Thinking and Mathematics—groups convened for the first time in
February 2005—presented their draft rubrics. Representatives from ETS
and ACT presented draft versions of questions they had developed for
exams in design to meet SCBA and map onto the SUNY-wide learning
outcomes. Representatives from Indiana University’s National Survey of
Student Engagement and its partner survey, Community College Survey of
Student Engagement, were in attendance to discuss these instruments,
which are designed to assess the broader academic environment.
On October 5, Provost Salins notified campuses that the deadline for
campus responses to SCBA had been extended from its original November
15, 2005 to February 15, 2006. He indicated that SUNY System
Administration had approved a SUNY version of the Collegiate Assessment
of Academic Proficiency (CAAP) exam from ACT for assessment of Critical
Thinking and Basic Communication. Information about that instrument was
made available to SUNY campuses via the ACT website in late October
2005.
A revised draft of the rubric recommended by the Discipline-Based
Panel on Writing was made available on October 7, 2005. A draft of the
rubric recommended by the Critical Thinking Panel was provided on
October 6, 2005. The final draft of the Mathematics panel was submitted
September 8, 2005. On October 22 2005, the Faculty Council of Community
Colleges, at its fall plenary, approved the standards and rubrics developed
by the three discipline-based panels. On October 27, 2005, the Executive
Committee of the University Faculty Senate passed a resolution approving
the standards and rubrics.
In Fall 2005, the University at Albany’s General Education Committee
and the General Education Assessment Subcommittee reviewed the
materials for SCBA and recommended that faculty representatives be
convened to examine the options and recommend a campus response. Two
advisory groups were established, a Critical Thinking and Writing group
and a Mathematics and Statistics group. The groups met in the Fall of 2005
to examine the options and advise the General Education Committee, its
Assessment Subcommittee and the Undergraduate Academic Council of
their recommendations. The Assessment Subcommittee suggested the
groups consider the instructional feedback potential, curricular impact,
student learning and motivation, and administration in their evaluation of
the options.
The Critical Thinking and Writing group recommended campus-wide
adoption of both the Critical Thinking rubric and the Writing rubric and
their implementation into the assessment activities normally scheduled
under the current campus General Education Assessment Plan. This group
urged a serious reevaluation of our campus writing curriculum, particularly
at the lower level, citing persistent concerns raised by University at Albany
faculty about students’ preparation for college-level writing, concerns that
mirror those voiced at universities nationwide. The implementation of the
rubrics was viewed as a first step in more concerted attention to writing
instruction and learning. The web-portfolio project planned for inclusion in
the Honors College was endorsed by the group as advancing key
instructional and learning benefits in writing; the group urged that this
pedagogic tool be supported for incorporation more broadly in the General
Education program. The following web links give further details on the
SUNY wide disciplinary panels in Critical Thinking and Writing and the
adopted draft rubrics: http://www.cortland.edu/gear/writingpanel.html,
http://www.cortland.edu/gear/criticalthinkingpanel. html
The Mathematics and Statistics group will continue to deliberate
before recommending a response. Our campus learning objectives reflect a
complex array of mathematical, statistical, and logical reasoning associated
with advanced mathematical skills. Moreover, the courses approved on this
campus in Mathematics and Statistics are broad-based, encompassing a
variety of quantitative and logical skills associated with advanced
mathematical reasoning. The draft versions of the standardized exam
questions that the group evaluated were judged to be remedial relative to
our curriculum. As such, they would have little value for improving student
learning or instruction and would certainly result in the loss of instructional
time. The group raised concerns about the motivation of students to
participate in an examination whose outcome was not incorporated into
their final course grade. Accordingly, the group was alarmed by the loss of
instructional control if an exam were required to be incorporated into the
course grade simply to accommodate a formularized assessment
mechanism. More information was requested regarding the flexibility in the
timing and manner of the administration of the exam, and more detail about
the exam itself is necessary before any final recommendation can be made.
The Vice Provost for Institutional Assessment and Diversity
recommended to the General Education Committee that the campus adopt
the National Survey of Student Engagement to assess the campus academic
environment.
UNIVERSITY AT ALBANY’S ASSESSMENT PLAN FOR
STRENGTHENED CAMPUS-BASED ASSESSMENT
1. The University at Albany learning objectives for the areas affected by
Strengthened Campus Based Assessment have not changed:
A. Basic Communication: Students will:
1. Produce coherent texts within common college-level written
forms;
Demonstrate the ability to revise and improve such texts;
3. Research a topic, develop an argument, and organize supporting
details.
B. Critical Thinking: Students will:
1. Identify, analyze, and evaluate arguments as they occur in their
own and other’s work;
2. Develop well reasoned arguments.
C. Mathematics: Students will demonstrate:
1. Knowledge of concepts, terms, and symbols used to analyze data;
2. An ability to formulate problems in abstract form amenable to
mathematical, statistical, or logical analysis;
3. An ability to perform appropriate operations to draw conclusions
from data;
4. An ability to interpret and communicate quantitative information.
2. Our process for evaluating and designating courses that fulfill campus
learning objectives in these areas of our curriculum have not changed.
3. The University at Albany has chosen to adopt the SUNY-wide disciplinary
rubrics to assess its learning objectives in critical thinking and writing. We
will continue using course embedded assessment in these two areas of our
General Education program. We are postponing a decision on how to
accommodate SCBA in the area of Mathematics and Statistics until we can
preview the nationally-normed measures approved by GEAR.. We will adopt
the National Survey of Student Engagement to assess the campus academic
environment.
In the areas of basic communication and critical thinking:
The rubrics for Basic Communication (writing) will be adopted
campus wide in courses designated as satisfying our campus writing
intensive requirement. All of the learning objectives reflected by the rubric
will be assessed. University at Albany considers the critical thinking to be
an infused competency. It is assessed in the context of our upper-level
writing intensive courses; the expectation is that these courses are taken
by students in their major as a capstone of their General Education
program.
Beginning Fall 2006, the Center for Excellence in Teaching and
Learning (CETL) will hold workshops for instructors of writing intensive
classes that introduce the rubric and develop ways of integrating and
implementing it into established courses. New courses proposed for
inclusion as fulfilling the campus writing intensive requirement will be
advised of the rubrics and referred to CETL. The campus strongly
recommends that instructors share the rubrics with students. The
assessment of Basic Communication and Critical Thinking will occur as
scheduled in Spring 2008. At that time we anticipate full campus adoption
of the disciplinary-based rubrics.
After pre-registration in the Fall of 2007 we will sample courses that
comprise roughly 25% of enrollments among the lower-level writing
intensive offerings (to assess Basic Communication) and 20% of the upper-
level writing intensive offerings (to assess Critical Thinking). Instructors
whose student work will be evaluated as part of the assessment will meet
before the semester commences; CETL will conduct training and norming
sessions with this set of instructors to prepare them to implement the
rubric. Instructors will submit their assessment plans in advance of the
Spring 2008 semester. All members of this instructor pool will be invited to
act as independent coders for each other at the end of the semester, for
compensation by SUNY System Administration (similarly, we hope that
System Administration compensates the University at Albany for the
enhanced CETL instruction that training and norming sessions will require).
If necessary, additional coders will be recruited from the broader pool of
instructors of upper- and lower-level writing intensive courses and trained
by CETL. At the end of the semester instructors in the assessment pool will
provide examples of student work. They will also submit their assessment
of the student work in light of the rubrics. Assessment coders will meet to
independently score at least 20% of the student products submitted.
In the area of Mathematics and Statistics:
The Mathematics and Statistics advisory group could not recommend
a campus response without additional information and evaluation, and
particularly without the opportunity to review an instrument approved for
SUNY-wide administration. Were we to repeat the cycle of assessment
reflected in our 2002 General Education Assessment Plan, Mathematics and
Statistics would be due for assessment in the 2006-2007 academic year.
However, since the assessment instrument has not been decided yet, its
assessment is now scheduled for the 2007-2008 (see 8 below). As we await
final determination from SUNY regarding an approved nationally-normed
instrument, the General Education Committee and the Mathematics and
Statistics ad hoc advisory committee will continue to consider how all
available options might be incorporated into our General Education
Assessment Plan.
4. We expect that the adoption of the rubrics by the Faculty Council of
Community Colleges and University Faculty Senate signals that these
instruments can derive a standard of our student performance relative to
other SUNY campuses. We will continue to employ the grade equivalents
outlined in our campus General Assessment Plan.
5. Our current campus practice includes an internal assessment review of
the methodologies, learning outcomes, and student perceptions of each of
the assessed categories by the General Education Committee, the General
Education Assessment Subcommittee, the Associate Dean for General
Education and the Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education. We continue
the practice of sharing the results of this internal assessment with the
faculty in whose courses students were assessed. As we begin our second
three-year assessment cycle, our sampling procedure replaces faculty
whose classes underwent assessment in the previous cycle. This serves the
purpose of enlarging the conversation around implementation and
assessment and engages more faculty in the development, implementation
and assessment of General Education on the campus. The campus-wide
implementation of the critical thinking and writing rubrics and their
inclusion in the course proposal process will increase their pedagogic value
beyond their implementation in scheduled assessments.
6. Institutional Research will take the lead on analyzing and reporting on
the NSSE results, and will work cooperatively with the Director of
Assessment, the Council on Academic Assessment, and the Undergraduate
Academic Council’s General Education Assessment Subcommittee to relate
NSSE findings to results emanating from the campus’s ongoing academic
assessment processes. In conformance to GEAR’s suggestion, we will
administer the NSSE every three years beginning in Spring 2007. Analysis
of results and reports that assess the academic climate, including their
relationship to academic assessment results, will be conducted over the
subsequent summer and fall terms.
7. In Fall 2005, the General Education Committee and the General
Education Assessment Subcommittee reported to the University at Albany’s
Undergraduate Academic Council their activities in response to SCBA. In
January 2006, the UAC agreed to forward the proposal reflected here to the
University Senate for review and discussion before its submission to the
GEAR group on behalf of SUNY System Administration. When we have
received feedback we will revise the General Education Assessment Plan.
Those revisions will receive full review from our governance structure.
8. The second full cycle of our General Education Assessment Plan includes
a switch in the scheduled order of the U.S. Historical Perspectives area
with Mathematics and Statistics:
Fall 2005/Spring 2006: The Arts, Humanities, Natural Sciences, and
Social Sciences
Fall 2006/Spring 2007: Europe (Western Civilizations), Regions
Beyond Europe (Other World Civilizations), U.S. Historical
Perspectives (American History), Foreign Languages
Fall 2007/Spring 2008: Mathematics and Statistics, Information
Literacy (Information Management), Oral Discourse (Basic
Communication), Writing Intensive (Basic Communication), Critical
Thinking
9. In 2002, The General Education Committee reported to the Dean of
Undergraduate Studies. It is now organized within the University’s
governance structure and reports to the UAC. The Committee and the
Council engage in regular review of the campus assessment process.
