Common Assessment Practices (2)

The best plans and reports share certain features. First, they include clearly defined limits: for instance, they might evaluate only three of six learning outcomes, or focus on undergraduate learning only. While it is advisable to use more than one method, most programs do not attempt to incorporate more than three forms of assessment, combining qualitative and quantitative methods. Sampling is frequent as well. Instead of reading all the papers in a certain course, an assessment committee might select one or two A papers, B papers, C papers, and so forth. Helen Bannan’s last assessment report as director of the Women’s Studies Program at the University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh (see appendix B), is a strong representative plan for a state institution, characterized by the extreme honesty of its discussions of shortcomings and its separate discussion of its general education courses. The main report is based on portfolios, exit interviews, and short pre- and post-tests designed to assess learning in the introductory course.

Jane Dickie’s report from Hope College, a small liberal arts school, is based largely on student surveys. For each goal, Dickie summarizes students’ responses in terms of the percentage that agree that they fulfilled the goal. But what is unique about the report is that following these data for each goal, Dickie includes a section titled “Student Voices,” in which she quotes extensively from undergraduate comments. For example, one response regarding the goal, “Students recognize and create interconnections through interdisciplinary learning,” focuses on big questions and the application of learning: “So many problems today are bigger than just psychology alone or social systems alone. Being able to look at the world and problems from different perspectives is so important. The women’s studies program at Hope introduced me to the idea of integrating disciplines and is one of the reasons I have pursued a dual graduate degree.”

A 360-degree program assessment and strategic plan, similar to the self-study reports described above, was prepared by Phyllis Baker at the University of Northern Iowa. The outcomes in the report are broken down into categories: general program goals and outcomes; teaching goals and outcomes; research goals and outcomes; and programming goals and outcomes. An appendix focuses on graduate student learning outcomes for those enrolled in the university’s Master of Arts in Women’s and Gender Studies program. This appendix is unusual in that it opens with a statement of “program philosophy of student outcomes assessment.” Such a statement would be useful in other institutions where university-wide assessment committees might lack a context for understanding the collaborative and student-centered nature of feminist assessment.

Works on feminist assessment and the assessment of Women’s Studies are included in the attached bibliography. For additional resources, see the Teagle Foundation bibliography of works on outcomes and assessment.