In fall 2000, Eastern Illinois University implemented an electronic writing portfolio (EWP) to assess students' writing skills. Students who were freshmen in fall 2000 and transfer students enrolling under the fall 2000 catalogue or subsequent catalogues must submit materials to the EWP. The EWP submissions come from each academic level as…

In December 2001, as part of a Preparing Tomorrow's Teachers to Use Technology grant, the St. Mary's College writing center dedicated space, software, and trained personnel to assist students and teachers in the writing and development of electronic portfolios. They created a unified space for faculty and student development across disciplines.…

William Paterson University (WPUNJ) is a midsize, public, comprehensive university in northern New Jersey, seventeen miles from New York City. The university offers thirty undergraduate and nineteen graduate degree programs in five colleges, has 350 full-time faculty members, and enrolls approximately 11,000 students. While faculty and staff at…

Monroe Community College (MCC), a two-year institution in the State University of New York (SUNY) system, attempted to launch an assessment initiative in 1990 but was only marginally successful. The effort concluded in 1991 with the development of student learning objectives for several academic programs. The early assessment organization featured…

In this article, the author describes an activity which was implemented in response to a question posed by her student. It was not a study implemented formally and so cannot offer contrasts and comparisons with previous student results. However, no student in this particular group handed in work that was below a pass. The exercise indicated that…

As an instructor of a multinational class, the author's challenge as a teacher was not the language but how to capitalize on the wealth of cultural diversity and keep the structure of the Group Dynamics course flexible and responsive. In this article, the author describes an exercise entitled "How Do I Know Thee: A Two-Part Program for Teachers…

In 1998, the University if Northern Colorado's General Education Council began to discuss ways of improving assessment of the general education program. Their search ended in a formal implementation of course-embedded assessment in all general education courses beginning in fall 2001. Course-embedded assessment is a classroom-based process that…

At Brown Mackie College, a private junior college in Kansas, faculty members are immersed in student learning on a daily basis and are doing an excellent job of incorporating assessment techniques in their classrooms. However, they depend mostly on administrative staff to help them provide a conducive environment to learning for the students. The…

Mississippi State University is participating in a pilot test of the Beginning College Student Survey (BCSS), the newest addition to the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE). The BCSS is designed to provide information about students' experiences in high school and expectations for college and parallels NSSE's premier survey of college…

College and university personnel have reported that learning communities increase retention and student learning. Maureen Franklin, vice president for academic affairs, realized the value that learning communities could have in academic life at Doane College (Crete, Nebraska), and in April 2003, she provided funds for two faculty members and one…

One of the most ambitious and intriguing developments in higher education in the world today is the so-called Bologna process in Europe. An initiative of the European Union, this process began in June 1999 when twenty-nine ministers in charge of higher education met to begin creating a European higher education area within which the comparability…