Community of Practice

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Community of Practice 5
ASSESSING THE INEFFABLE

• Arthur Chickering and Jon Dalton, Leaders
• Anita Henck, Synthesizer and Reporter
• AAHE Assessment Conference
• June 2002

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Definition of the Ineffable

• Incapable of being expressed in words
• Outcomes of higher education that are not easily
  defined nor assessed

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The call for participation included the following

• Spiritual growth, increased capacity to love and
  to be loved, strengthened authenticity and
  identity, emotional resilience and stability,
  empathy and altruism, character and integrity -
  these, and others, all are critical for
  satisfying lives and productive citizenship. Can
  we assess outcomes such as these? Should we try?
  Come struggle with us.

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Why is higher education looking at this?

• These issues are related to our missions and
  goals
• They are part of our responsibility to the
  developmental stages of our students
• These concepts are rooted in the concept of
  holistic education--the whole person

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Why ? (cont.)

• We are approaching our concerns
• About the students as individuals
• concerns for lack of individual depth
• need to teach social skills and values
• attempt to discuss changing social issues
• to fill the yearning they express
• About our community and our world
• reactive to world events
• community concerns result in extra funding for
  such studies
• academic response to community concerns (ex.
  voting pattern concerns --gt civic studies)

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Potential Topics

• Character Development
• Spiritual Growth
• Social Responsibility
• Empathy/Introspection/Self Development
• Emotional Resilience

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Desired Outcomes

• Definitions and indicators
• Assessment strategies
• Compile listing of work underway
• Form interest groups with contact info
• Develop post-conference synthesis and web page

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After defining the parameters of the question(s)

• How would you define the outcome?
• What would you look for as indicators?
• How would you assess the presence or absence?
• Are there relevant conceptual frameworks?
• What related work is already underway?

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Current Projects/Initiatives

• Research projects
• Faithful Change
• Taking Values Seriously
• Boyer Center (Messiah College)
• Civic Engagement (Colby-Erlich)
• Education as Transformation
• Alverno College

• Research support
• Lilly Foundation
• Templeton
• Academic courses
• Science religion
• Psychoeducational
• Ethics
• Spirituality
• Religion
• Service learning

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Range of language and terminology

• Character development
• Leadership
• Values
• Moral
• Civic
• Social responsibility
• Citizenship education
• Integrity
• Wisdom
• Ethics
• Psychoeducation
• Vocation
• Professionalism
• Social action

• Purpose
• Meaning
• Authenticity
• Faith
• Service
• Ministry
• Spirituality
• Spiritual formation
• Spiritual growth
• Empathy
• Introspection
• Self development
• Emotional resilience
• Perfect community

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Common Factors of These Terms

• Talk about relationship to others
• Emphasize responsibility and response-ability
• Focus on valuing in decision-making
• Need for wisdom in applicability
• Need assessment tools
• All are qualitative terms

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Developmental Stage Theory Resources

• Education and Identity -- Chickering
• Modern American College (Ego Development --
  Loevinger)
• Ego Development -- Weathersby
• Cognitive and moral development -- Kohlberg
• Forms of Intellectual and Ethical Development --
  Perry

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Developmental Stage Theory Resources (cont.)

• In a Different Voice -- Gilligan
• Womens Ways of Knowing -- Belenky
• The Evolving Self -- Kegan
• Stages of Faith -- Fowler

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Indicators

• Positives
• Upset about cheating
• Act on it
• Valuing diversity
• Citizenship
• Learn language of values
• Connect life and learning
• Self transcendence
• Maintaining balance and reflective time

• Negatives
• Inability to move language to action
• Ritualistic party line
• Being judgmental
• Self-centeredness
• Sexist, racist, homophobic, biased language and
  behavior
• Dishonesty (academic and other)

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Indicators (cont.)

• Positives (cont.)
• Thoughtful leadership
• Persistence re causes
• Engagement

• Negatives (cont.)

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Research Issues

• Assume multimethod research approach
• Written survey/questionnaire of knowledge/
  reported behavior with researcher interviews
  (faith development study)
• Case study with researcher observation and
  feedback and student self-evaluation (social
  interaction study)
• Combination of educational and evaluative
  enterprises (in higher education environment)
• Research subject role of both learner and focus
  of evaluative process

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Research Issues (cont.)

• Both matriculating student and alumnus review
  (longitudinal beyond the institution)
• Holistic evaluation of student by college
  (multidimensional -- academic progress, spiritual
  growth, values clarification, etc.)
• Ambivalence of individual privacy/freedom vs.
  institutional intrusiveness -- balance of
  institutional research vs. student growth through
  feedback from study

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Research Issues (cont.)

• Creation of reflective culture and its impact on
  student outcomes
• Balance of individual student outcome evaluation
  versus transformation of the campus culture
• Ethical issues of institutional responsibility
  -- in studying/not studying vs. method of inquiry
• References -- Transpersonal Research Methods for
  the Social Sciences, Braud Anderson
  Persistence and Change, Newcomb and Religious
  Pluralism in the Academy Opening the Dialogue,
  Nash

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Next Steps

• Continued dialogue
• Development of focused discussions
• Shared information
• More?