Morningside College:

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Fall Faculty Workshop August 21,
2008 Assessment CLA
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• Why Assessment
• Four Approaches to Assessment
• The Collegiate Learning Assessment CLA
• Using the CLA at Morningside

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Why Measure Educational Outcomes?

• We measure what we value, we value what we
  measure
• Improve quality of student learning by creating a
  culture of assessment
• Informing pedagogy and curricular design
• Making assessment integral part of teaching and
  learning
• Create formative evaluation for the institution,
  programs, major
• Enable conversations about academic expectations
  and standards

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Why Measure Educational Outcomes?

• Given accountability pressures, if we dont
  initiate, it will be done for us

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Four Approaches

• Actuarial indicators (graduation rates, access)
• Quality rankings (US News World Report)
• Student surveys (NSSE, CIRP)
• Direct measures of student learning CLA

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Four Approaches Actuarial Indicators

• What are the admissions test scores of entering
  students?
• What percent of students graduated?
• How diverse is the student body?
• For example, see U-Can at http//www.ucan-networ
  k.org/searchInstitution.asp

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Four Approaches Surveys

• To what extent has your experience at this
  institution contributed to your ability to think
  critically and analytically?
• Very Much ? Quite a Bit ?
• Some ? Very Little ?
• For example The National Survey of Student
  Engagement (NSSE)
• http//www.usatoday.com/news/education/2007-11-04-
  nsse-how-to_N.htm?locinterstitialskip

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Four Approaches Rankings

• Question for presidents, provosts and deans of
  admission rate the academic program of other
  universities, where 1 marginal and 5
  distinguished.
• Measuring value-added what percentage of your
  students did you expect to graduate, and what
  percentage actually did?
• For example US News
• http//colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/usne
  ws/edu/college/rankings/brief/t1ccbach_mw_brief.ph
  p

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Current Approaches Direct Measures

• Measures that assess what students are actually
  able to do
• For example, The Collegiate Learning Assessment
  CLA

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The CLA measures four sets of higher order skills

• The CLA measures in a holistic manner
• Critical thinking
• Analytic reasoning
• Problem solving
• Written communication

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CLA Scoring CriteriaCritical Thinking, Analytic
Reasoning, and Problem Solving Skills

• Evaluation of Evidence
• Analysis and Synthesis of Evidence
• Drawing Conclusion
• Acknowledging Alternative Explanations/Viewpoints

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CLA Scoring CriteriaWriting Skills

• Presentation
• Development
• Persuasiveness
• Mechanics
• Interest

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• The CLA gets at some of our educational outcomes

1. Demonstrate analytic, synthetic, creative,
   evaluative, and quantitative thinking.
2. Communicate effectively
3. Behave ethically and responsibly -
4. Use knowledge of cultures to enhance
   understanding of themselves and others -
5. Apply knowledge and skills from multiple, diverse
   disciplines and practical experiences to
   understand complex issues and solve problems ?
6. Exhibit a passion for life-long learning -
7. Effect positive change through leadership or
   active participation in communities -
8. Articulate their own spirituality and values,
   while understanding those of others -

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There are three types of CLA measures

• Analytic Writing Task Make-an-Argument
• Analytic Writing Task Critique-an-Argument
• Performance Task

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Analytic Writing Task Make-an-Argument

• Writing a persuasive, analytic essay to support a
  position on an issue

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Make-an-Argument

• Government funding would be better spent on
  preventing crime than in dealing with criminals
  after the fact.
• Directions 45 minutes, present your
  perspective on the issue, using relevant reasons
  and/or examples to support your views

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Government Funding

• Establish a thesis
• Maintain the thesis
• Support the thesis with examples
• Anticipate and counter opposing arguments

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Analytic Writing Task Critique-an-Argument

• Critiquing Written Arguments

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Analytic Writing Task Critique-an Argument

• Butter has now been replaced by margarine in
  Happy Pancake House restaurants throughout the
  southwestern United States. Only about 2 percent
  of customers have complained, indicating that 98
  people out of 100 are happy with the change.
  Furthermore, many servers have reported that a
  number of customers who still ask for butter do
  not complain when they are given margarine
  instead. Clearly, either these customers cannot
  distinguish margarine from butter, or they use
  the term "butter" to refer to either butter or
  margarine. Thus, to avoid the expense of
  purchasing butter, the Happy Pancake House should
  extend this cost-saving change to its restaurants
  in the southeast and northeast as well.
• Directions 30 minutes, discuss what is wrong
  with the argument

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The Happy Pancake House

• Identify logical flaws or fallacies
• How do these logical flaws influence the
  arguments conclusion

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Performance Task

• Analyzing complex, realistic scenarios

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Performance Task
Features Open-Ended Document-Based Real Life
Scenarios Components Document Library
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Crime Reduction

• Pat Stone is running for reelection as the
  mayor of Jefferson, a city in the state of
  Columbia. Mayor Stones opponent in this contest
  is Dr. Jamie Eager. Dr. Eager is a member of the
  Jefferson City Council. You are a consultant to
  Mayor Stone. Mayor Stone wants to make sure the
  best policy for reducing crime in Jefferson is
  identified, so has asked you to analyze the
  strengths and/or limitations of Dr. Eagers
  proposal.
• Directions 90 minutes, use the evidence from
  the Document Library to answer the following
  questions.

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Performance Task

• Synthesize information from multiple sources
• Recognize conflicting evidence
• Interpret data, tables, figures correctly
• Identify logical fallacies
• Develop conclusions based on available evidence

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Crime Reduction

• Student is advising the mayor, who is running for
  re-election.
• There is an upcoming mayoral debate, for which
  the student must help the incumbent mayor
  prepare.

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Crime Reduction

• There are two policy approaches for reducing
  crime
• Drug education program
• Increasing number of police officers on the
  streets

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Crime Reduction

• Documents available to the student include
• Newspaper article about crime in the community
• Research abstracts about drug education program
• Report about success of a drug education program
  in another community
• Police report (with table of data) about crime
  and drug use in the community
• Plots of the relationship between police offers
  and crime
• Private investigator report about possible
  connection between opponent and drug education
  program

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Crime Reduction

• Using these data, what does the student advise
  that the mayor should do?

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Performance Tasks

• Not all quantitative
• Artwork and Technology

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At Morningside College

• Invited to join the CIC-CLA consortium
• approx 40 colleges
• four year commitment
• Will administer the CLA to at least 100 first
  year students and 100 seniors each year
• This year all 300 first year students
• Share data and work with the consortium

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• CIC-CLA Consortium
• Alaska Pacific University Allegheny College
• Aurora University Averett University
• Barton College Bethel University (MN)
• Cabrini College Carlow University
• Charleston Southern Univ. College of Notre Dame
  (MD)
• College of St. Benedict/Saint Johns University
• Dominican University Drake University
• Franklin Pierce University Hilbert College
• Illinois College Indiana Wesleyan Univ.
• Jamestown College John Carrol Univ.
• Juniata College LaGrange College
• Lynchburg College Marion University (WI)
• Morningside College Nebraska Wesleyan Univ.
• Pace University Pacific University
• Seton Hill University Southwestern University
  (TX)
• Springfield College Stephens College
• Stonehill College Texas Lutheran University
• The College of St. Scholastica University of
  Findlay

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Questions?

• Other Options

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CLA in the Classroom helps address the What
Now? question

• The key to accountability is not just
  transparency, but also improvement
• CLA in the Classroom connects the
  institution-wide CLA results to the
  classroom-level and faculty work on student
  learning
• A means to link institution-wide summative
  assessment with local, formative work

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One component of the program supports diagnostic
work

• Use of a retired (classic) performance task
  in a classroom, with administration, scoring and
  advising resources
• In addition, classroom activities are suggested
• Designed to provide diagnostic feedback to
  students to understand why they achieved the
  scores they did, and what to do next to improve
  their skills

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Another key component enables curricular efforts

• In addition, faculty walk through a process to
  develop their own performance tasks
• Faculty can embed course content in the tasks
  they create
• These faculty-developed tasks could be used as
  class assignments or group projects

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CLA in the Classroom Academy

• Gain a deeper understanding of the CLA
• Learn how to administer and score a disclosed CLA
  Performance Task
• Develop performance tasks where course content
  can be embedded
• Learn more about rubric-based assessment as it
  applies to the CLA
• Brainstorm strategies for using these approaches
  in courses or across the institutions