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Turnout imporant as we add math assessment
So far the level of cooperation we get from our students on our assessment program has been encouraging. Last year, we had 90 out of 120 eligible students take the CAAP reading module, a substantial increase from the year before and a sign -- I hope -- of increased acceptance of the need for assessment by students, faculty and alike. This year, we have an added challenge since we're adding the math module of the Collegiate Assessment of Academic Proficiency. That means CAAP testing will begin at 10 a.m. and last till noon..
And that means we'll want to make an extra push to get our students to take the tests on Assessment Day, Wednesday, March 29. I plan to lead my 10 o'clock sophomore humanities class to the testing room, perhaps not quite like Moses and the children of Israel but with a rod and a staff all the same. Well, at least with threats of a rod and a staff to come.
English instructor Amy Lakin gave me the idea, when she recalled at a recent Assessment Committee meeting how she got 100 percent participation from her sophomore lit class last spring.
"I shuttled them down there (to the testing room)." Amy said. "I explained to them, 'This is to help us [retain accreditation and improve academic programming].' Then I said, 'You have to do it.' Some of them said, 'Why?' And I said, 'Because I said so.' Then I stood by the door as they were leaving the room, and I walked them right down there."
So ... that's one way to do it. Other instructors, of course, are free to do what they think best. But we do need our students to take the tests. They are at 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. The evening time is scheduled primarily for adult accelerated students, but traditional students can take the test then as well. And adult students can take the test at 10. Academic Affairs Dean John Cicero asks faculty to "please inform [students] that they will not be penalized for any assigned work they might miss by taking the test on Wednesday. Of course, they still must make up any assigned work, but please temporarily suspend your usual attendance policy for those students who miss your class to participate in the CAAP testing."
Faculty members are free to adapt to the testing regimen as they see fit. Since my 10 o'clock humanities class is full of sophomores, as I said, I plan to just lead them across the hall to the CAAP test. Others, of course, will do what they think best depending on the number of sophomores they have in the class, among other factors.
But I can't stress highly enough how important it is for us to have a good turnout -- and therefore a good statistical response rate -- for the CAAP tests. Dean Cicero put it best:
The individual and aggregate scores we receive from the CAAP test are significant by themselves as a way determine the reading comprehension and mathematics level of our second-year students. However, since we now have the ability to link CAAP scores with ACT scores, the information is even more valuable as a way to assess the progress students have made as a result of attending SCI, both on an institutional and national level.
And, of course, it doesn't hurt to remember we're mandated to do the standardized testing.
Assessment, growth and blue-ribbon commissions
Derek Bok, interim president of Harvard University, recently had a very cogent response in to the Bush administration's talk of a national standardized test for college students similar to the No Child Left Behind regimin at the K-12 levels of education. The idea of NCLB at the college level was proposed by Commission on the Future of Higher Education appointment by Bush's Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings. Bok's response appeared March 5 on the op-ed page of The Washington Post. (Thanks to Brian Carrigan, by the way, for bringing it to this month's Assessment Committee meeting.) I'm linking it to this page, but will keep a hard copy in my office in case the paper quits archiving it.
Bok said the "growing concern for accountability" in government and business, both major sources of higher education funding, is justified. But he said "standardized tests are a poor way to improve the situation. It is extremely difficult to capture what students should be learning in a single set of exams, especially when colleges and their student bodies are so diverse." Standardized testing works well enough with base-line skills like reading and math -- the skills we test for with the CAAP program -- but fill-in-the-bubble tests "tend to include much that is trivial while leaving out much more that is important." The alternative is the kind of balanced assessment program so many colleges and universities are undertaking already.
Useful reforms can come only from within the universities. Academic leaders will have to work with their faculties to develop methods of assessing student learning that are appropriate to their institutions. They will need to provide funds to experiment and evaluate new teaching methods. They can offer more extensive training of graduate teaching assistants and young faculty members. Above all, they should try to emulate other well-run organizations by initiating a sustained process of improvement in which they continuously evaluate their educational programs, identify weaknesses and experiment with new ways to remedy their deficiencies.
That process of continuous evaluation, experimentation and remediation, of course, is what is mandated by the North Central Association and the other regional accrediting bodies. And it is what we have been doing at SCI. As Bok makes clear in his op-ed piece in The Post, it is a work in progress both at the institutional level and nationally. It is not finished, in other words. In fact, by its very nature it will never be finished. But it adds up to a time of constructive change. Says Bok:
Ultimate success or failure ... will depend on the faculty. Conceivably, professors will refuse to cooperate, invoking academic freedom or accusing critics of meddling in matters they do not understand. But better things may be in store. Reports from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, located at Stanford University, reveal that faculties have become much more interested in undergraduate education since 1970. Groups of professors on many campuses have formed to talk about new ways of teaching. More than half of American colleges are assessing student progress toward at least some important educational goals. Granted, few of them as yet are using these assessments to build a comprehensive process for identifying weaknesses in their programs and experimenting with possible improvements. Still, the elements of such a system are in place on many campuses. In time, more and more colleges and faculties may find that searching for better ways of helping students learn can be as engrossing as seeking new knowledge in the library and laboratory. The next 20 years might just turn out to be one of the most productive periods in the history of higher education.
Assessment has been a struggle at times at SCI, as it has been nationally. Boks' op-ed piece is interesting not only because it offers a cogent case against what sounds like a very unwise idea, i.e. a college-level NCLB test. It also suggests we at SCI have shared in some of the struggles, accomplishments and future promise of assessment for continuous improvment of our educational program.
-- Pete Ellertsen, chair, Assessment Committee
Nuts & Bolts is an electronic newsletter published by SCI's Assessment Committee. Members are: Bob Blankenberger, humanities and social science; Amy Lakin, languages and literature; Steve Stowers, math; Barb Tanzyus, math; Ray Bruzan, chemistry; Brian Carrigan, science; Sr. Anna Izydorczyk, student; and Pete Ellertsen (chair), communications and humanities. Kevin Broeckling, dean of students; and John Cicero, academic affairs dean, serve ex officio.
If you have information, comments or feedback, please contact any committee member or Nuts & Bolts editor Pete Ellertsen, in Becker L-16A on the SCI campus, 525-1420 ext. 519 or by e-mail at <pellertsen@sci.edu>.
