• Student outcomes assessment will be conducted at the program level. Each department will be asked to develop and implement an assessment plan for each of its programs. Departments offering programs at both the graduate and undergraduate level should develop a separate plan for the each program since the competencies the students are expected to have at the end of the program are different. Programs with multiple majors or concentrations at only one level (associate, bachelors, or graduate) can have a more comprehensive mission statement relating all subprograms to a unified purpose.

• Program assessment is not an evaluation of individual students, faculty or staff. Rather it is a process used to indicate the extent to which a program’s faculty and staff achieve the objectives they set for their students. Outcomes assessment enables faculty to understand the strengths/weaknesses of their programs; to identify and prioritize goals; to make financial decisions based on their academic priorities; be able to report on the quality of the education they are providing; and continually improve their program.

• Assessment at the course level will also be undertaken at Pratt. It will consist of

• review and revision of course syllabi to include expected learning outcomes and

• review and revision of course evaluations to assess achievement of student expected learning.

Course-level assessment is beyond the scope of this website. Guidelines will be provided by the Provost’s office in the coming months.

Preparing for Program Assessment

• Departments should decide how the assessment plans will be developed; approaches vary:  appointing a planning and assessment committee; designating an existing committee to assume planning and assessment responsibilities; and using the whole program faculty as a committee-of-the-whole. It is important that faculty have ample opportunities to participate in the process.

• Faculty should familiarize themselves with the contents of this handbook.

Some Practical Advice to Make Assessment Meaningful

• Plan to assess all your program’s academic goals over a brief (1 to 3 years) period of time;

• Don’t try to assess everything all at once;

• If you get the same results with repeated assessments, you need not keep assessing the same item for several years;

• Use both direct and indirect methods of assessment;

• Use methods that faculty in your discipline are familiar with: e.g., if your discipline does not use tight statistical designs, descriptive studies may be appropriate;

• If you have some key concerns or questions about your program, focus your major assessment efforts upon those;

• What is most important to find out?

• What do you really want to learn?

• Build your assessment plan to provide the best data that your department can use, not simply to satisfy an accreditation or administrative requirement;

Assessment plans will evolve over time:  if something doesn’t work or new questions arise after an assessment, change the plan;

Adapted from Skidmore: Some Practical Advice to Make Assessment Meaningful