Re: Assessment of science programs and courses

[forinas@indiana.edu (kyle forinash)]

Hi;

I will be in a similar boat about two years from now (except we do not have
a degree program so it should be easier). I would appreciate it very much
if you could relay whatever info you gather so that those of use having to
do this in the future will know where to start.

One suggestion is to try to track down former students and sent them a
survey asking about the strengths and weaknesses of your program. You might
also try to identify the percentage of your former students who went on to
be gainfully employed (broken down in different job catagories) etc. I
helped out with a review of the philosophy dept here recently and they
included at the following in their review:
1. syllabi
2. final exams (with comparisons to those given at other schools)
3. library orders and evaluation of collection
4. guidelines for courses, course descriptions
5. teaching evaluations (with commentary)
6. letters recognizing outstanding students (and other awards by students)
7. grades and incompletes given
8. information on part-time and full time faculty development and scholarly
activities
9. oportunities for student work-study/internships

I would add pre and post testing for specific courses (but I don't see how
that can be done effectively without using standardized tests). You could
also see if you could get profs and others (for example employers hiring
your grads) to come in and do some external evaluations/consultations.

Good luck and let us know what you come up with.
kyle

At 3:23 PM 8/20/97, Sr. Margaret Clarke wrote:
> This is directed mainly at persons in the North Central Association region, who
> probably already know that the main thrust of NC visits is now assessment.  As
> chair of the Natural Science Division of our college, I have just returned from
> a two day meeting with the dean and other division chairs and find myself
> charged with spearheading the development of an assessment program for the
> science and math departments.  We are all pretty traditionalist in our
> division,
> and I frankly don't have much of a clue as to the kind of thing that North
> Central wants;  we were pretty much assured that what is NOT acceptable in such
> a program is exams, including standardized exams, peer review of anything,
> external accreditation reviews.  What we have to do is to create a means of
> determining what we have actually taught our students that does not involve any
> of the above.  I would appreciate any suggestions that might be
> forthcoming from
> anyone whose department / institution has already achieved North Central
> approval of its assessment program, particularly as it relates to the
> sciences:
> physics, chemistry, biology, math.  Any help anyone can provide will be
> sincerely appreciated.
> Margaret J. Clarke
> College of St. Scholastica
> Duluth MN 55811      mclarke@css.edu

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