What are the ways in which you will measure your chosen criterion? For example, think of a pre and post test—a quiz, a journal entry, a short writing sample to know the knowledge students bring when entering class. Embed this in another exercise you will give at the end of the semester. You could also have assignments along the way to see development (or lack of) of the students in your chosen criteria.
It is recommended that all materials used in assessment are recorded on D2L, so they could be directly collected from D2L (with your permission) for your Assessment report. In addition, this allows students to see how their assignment grade(s) are being translated into learning objectives: If students can see their own progress, assessment becomes truly useful.
For more examples of potential assessment plan structures or for feedback on your proposed assessment plan, contact the UCC office at corecurr@siu.edu.
How will you measure student progress? You can find the generic LEAP rubrics on D2L under Assessments. Alternatively, you can choose to submit your assessment scores through email at the end of the semester.
IV. Assessment Report: Includes Assessment plan, Assessment grid (emailed or through D2L rubrics/assignments), and student demographic information (provided by the university). See Assessment Report and Reflection for more details.
V. Reflection: Consider and submit a brief reflection/narrative on your course. Why you choose the particular course objectives? Why were these meaningful for your course?What aspects of your course succeeded? Where do you see the greatest leaps in knowledge? What were the gaps? What you would do again and what would you do differently? See Assessment Report and Reflection for more details on writing the reflection document.
Please submit completed assessment plans to the UCC office via email. Make sure to thoroughly fill in every section (where applicable) in the plan. If you would like assistance filling out or updating your Assessment Plan Template, please email the Assessment GA (Emily) or the UCC Director corecurr@siu.edu.
You may also give the UCC permission to access your assessment grades directly from D2L for your courses, as specified in your assessment plan. This method saves you time, and we do not need any passwords or account information aside from what assignment names/rubrics we should be pulling. Once given permission, we will continue to collect your assessment directly from D2L each semester unless your assessment plan changes.
UCC Course Assessment Process
Each semester that a Core Course is taught, the instructor or course coordinator record and collect assessment data in line with the course's assessment plan. At the end of the semester, the assessment report process begins. Here is a rough outline of the steps the University Core Curriculum office currently follows to process your assessment data into a report:
At the end of the semester, each course/section sends in their collected assessment data (see here for a downloadable example of the preferred data format) or the data is collected directly from D2L rubrics or assignment grades, in line with a course's assessment plan.
You will receive an email at the beginning and end of each semester you teach a CORE course, to remind you about collecting and sending in your assessment data.
If we have questions about your emailed data, or are unable to collect your data from D2L, the UCC office with email you in the following semester to clarify you assessment plan or data.
If you are unsure what is in your course's assessment plan, or need to update your plan due to a change in course curriculum, please email corecurr@siu.edu and we can send you a copy of your plan or help you update it
The UCC office then takes your assessment data and converts them into score on a 1-5 scale (with a Note Evaluated-NE option), so we can compare Learning Objective scores across courses and across time. These scores roughly align to a F-A grading scale, with NE indicating a student did not complete the assessment assignment(s).
We then turn your data into an interactive excel report (see examples below) using each students' scores and demographic information provided by the university. These reports are useful for you in a few ways (see more details in the tab below):
Easy-to-read format
Compare scores and grades across semesters or between sections
Look at potential patterns among student learning
Evaluate areas of improvement for high-risk students
Once your interactive assessment report is ready (usually 1-2 semesters), we will send your report back to you and answer any questions you may have.
We encourage you to examine your report and reflect on how your course went, your students' learning, and if there is anything you want to change about your course or assessment, based on your data and course expectations.
If you would like a guided run-through of the notable features in your report or instructions on how to work various features of the report (like slicers), please email Emily at the UCC office (corecurr@siu.edu).
Lastly, the Higher Learning Commission (HLC) requires that we collect a short (0.5-1 page) reflection on what you find relevant out of the assessment report and if you plan to make any changes to your course based on what you found.
We then file away your reflection and record a portion of your assessment data in a separate document for the Higher Learning Commission (HLC).
When Are Assessment Data Due?
Please turn in your Assessment data to the UCC director at corecurr@siu.edu no later than the end of the first week of the semester following the semester in which you taught the course. If your assessment is finished earlier than the final week of the semester (e.g., assessing via a mid-semester project), please send in your assessment data early or email us early about collecting your data from D2L. We will email all instructors of UCC courses near the end of each semester to remind you to wrap up your data collection and answer any questions.
