University of Rhode Island
Student Learning Outcomes Oversight Committee
(LOOC)
Meeting Minutes
January 30, 2015
12:30-2:00pm
Pharmacy Building, Room 207
In attendance:
Marilyn Barbour (interim Chair) Brian Heikes
Laura Beauvais Anne Hubbard
Gary Boden Norma Owens
Joanna Burkhardt Deb Rosen
Elaine Finan John Stevenson
Diane Goldsmith Rick Vaccaro
Michael Greenfield (via phone)
I. Approval of October 2014 Meeting Minutes
· Motion to Approve – Approved
o Clarification requested by Mike about October SLOAA Update: “Are accredited programs around the university able to compare benchmarks to institutions with similar programs?“
§ Clarification: This question was presented to the group, as Pharmacy/Engineering participate and conduct an EBI (Educational Benchmarking, Inc.) survey, which compares URI’s program to selected, peer institutions.
II. Announcements
· Marilyn: Sandy stepped down as Chair; Marilyn will assume duties as interim Chair through May 2015.
· Diane: URI has dropped out of the national assessment program: Multistate Collaborative. With the exit of Deborah Grossman-Garber, there was not any leadership at the state level or funding.
o Elaine: Will be interesting to watch and learn from CCRI, who successfully collected artifacts for MSC: in regards to both time involvement and scoring.
III. SLOAA Update (Elaine Finan)
· Summary data from Cohort I Undergraduate/Graduate (reported May 2014)
o Compliance: Did programs report? New assessment (section I) & follow-up to recommendations of change (section II)
o Results: How did programs score in the peer-reviewed rubric process?
§ Score Options: Advanced, Well Developed, Developing, N/A, Missing
o Handout 1: Undergraduate Assessment Reports Results: Cohort I (2014)
o Handout 2: Assessment of Student Learning Outcomes Undergraduate
§ Look at compliance and performance institution wide, and across colleges
§ Hope to get comparison to 2012 to see trends and improvement.
§ Next step: rubric elements/sub-elements weaknesses/strengths, how aligned are we with LEAP outcomes,
o Norma: Learned a lot about the reporting process as a peer reviewer. Perhaps our goal could be to have a peer reviewer from each college who could serve as a resource for future reporting.
IV. Work Group Updates
· Group 1 – Prepare a solicitation for Data Stories with models and purposes. (Sandy Hicks, Leslie Kealhofer-Kemp, Gary Boden)
o Theme: “Tell a good story about student learning outcomes”
§ Celebratory, but instructive
§ Not just program-level
o Topics
§ Actual data- things you could chart
§ How learning outcomes relate to revision/creation of majors, minors, certificate programs
o Audience(s)
§ Faculty and students who would relate to the relevance of the story
§ Promote learning outcomes to the people who would actually use them
§ Show learning success
§ Wider audience:
· Create a LOOC website
o Currently part of assessment website, create “Data Stories” Link with LOOC ownership
· Videos to tell stories
o Reach out to someone for communication help
o Hope to come up with 15 story ideas and a template for creating data stories – by spring 2015
§ Solicit people for ideas
§ LOOC should approve all data stories before delivery
§ Idea: J-Term: learning outcomes related to new method of course delivery
§ Idea: Living learning communities
§ Diane: Could contact Josh Caulkins/Joan Peckham/David Byrd who are already looking at how faculty have made changes in their courses.
· E.g. Kim Fornier Anatomy/Physiology Courses
§ John: looking for Section II data as a model
· Elaine: NEASC report now has Section II data for both undergraduate and graduate programs in Cohort I
o Will be uploaded to SLOAA website in near future
o Mike: Could we utilize the outstanding student profiles that URI puts together for uri.edu around graduation? We want to emulate on a broader scale – programs.
o Next step:
§ Start by identifying “Advanced” Section II Data
· Include both undergraduate and graduate programs
§ Gary requests data stories be sent by each of the LOOC members for next meeting
· Group 2 – Identify exemplary reports for Section I and a separate recognition of superior reports for Section II. (Rick Vaccaro & Alicia Curtin)
o SLOAA has top scoring sets - looking for the best quality of process
o LOOC policy: LOOC will provide a summary to Faculty Senate with identification of exemplars for potential recognition
o Next step: Identify exemplary reports, create recognition process
§ Create library of exemplar programs to help new assessment participants
§ Possible categories:
· Accredited v Non-Accredited
· Graduate v Undergraduate
· Group 3 – Develop a schedule each semester of assessment-related events conducted by in-house and external presenters. (Anne Hubbard, Mary MacDonald, John Stevenson, Norma Evans)
o Recommend annual fall and spring events
§ Fall:
· Celebrate and/or acknowledge exemplary groups identified from previous May reports
· Advertised widely
· Supported by provost’s office
§ Spring:
· Workshop or how-to for assessment
o Be sure to include students in assessment process
o Looking for orientation events (new department chairs, faculty, grad program directors)
§ Turnover has been an issue regarding assessment duties: new faculty are not made aware of duties
§ Provide a condensed/brief look at assessment norms on our campus
o Timeline: Would May reports reviews be ready for a Fall event?
§ Elaine: In order to meet this deadline, we might have to consider shortening time period of report acceptance or what we are asking for
· Increase the number of reviewers
§ Laura: Might need to flip Fall/Spring timing
· Group 4 – Review Assessment Report feedback rubric results to identify high-incidence problems and develop professional development opportunities to address them. (Brian Heikes, Laura Beauvais, Marilyn Barbour, Diane Goldsmith, John Stevenson)
o Need feedback rubric results – SLOAA to provide
· John: Propose that LOOC could take responsibility and host a Spring 2015 event to identify exemplars
o Marilyn: We didn’t do a LOOC report for the Faculty Senate last year, maybe we could include a presentation of the exemplars to the Faculty Senate with our report, then host a reception after
o Provost’s office would likely be amenable for some funds
·
V. SLOAA Update continued - Graduate Program Update (John Stevenson)
§ Handout 1: Graduate Assessment Reports Results: Cohort I (2014)
o Has proved challenging to get graduate programs to participate and conform graduate data into our assessment model
o Marilyn: Are the 10 plans not yet submitted trickling in?
§ 5-6 graduate plans are in progress
· Handout 2: Assessment of Student Learning Outcomes Graduate
VI. LOOC Membership Discussion
· Propose to make official changes to membership to amend and add another “Assessment Staff” slot. Marilyn will send out information via email in the next month.
· Discuss chronically empty spots: haven’t been able to figure out how to keep membership in certain slots.
Meeting Adjourned: 2:00pm