Recently, higher education has witnessed a renewed commitment to the mission of preparing students for lives of active citizenship. Under the leadership of President Lawrence S. Bacow, Tufts University (Medford, Massachusetts) has articulated an institutional mission that embraces three areas of focus: active citizenship, internationalism, and…

For quite some time, the call to close the feedback loop has been heard throughout higher education. Faculty and administrators have paid attention, and now they can more easily than ever point to the fact that at their institution, the feedback loop is almost always closed. As reviewers from accreditation teams visit campuses, they often hear…

Imagine that a student--let's call him Michael--has earned a score of 55 on an examination. How well did he do? Was his score good enough for him to pass the examination, or pass the course, or be deemed at least minimally competent in whatever the exam was assessing? Michael's score alone, in the absence of any other information, cannot answer…

During the 2006 fall semester, Nashville State Technical Community College (NSCC) completed a review of its general education program, including assessment of student success. A major advantage in assessing general education is that a number of measures are available for this purpose. A major disadvantage is that these measures rarely can be tied…

Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU) is a private institution with some 1,800 undergraduate students and approximately 117 faculty, 34 of whom teach in the School of Liberal Arts. In October 2005, the vice president for academic affairs asked these authors to attend the Assessment Institute in Indianapolis. As full-time faculty, it was their…

The primary goal of classroom assessment is the improvement of student learning rather than the evaluation of teaching through observation. Many formative assessment techniques, including the group instructional feedback technique (GIFT), electronic mail feedback, and small group instructional diagnosis, carry an implicit or explicit promise of…

The State University of New York (SUNY) assessment initiative is an ambitious project that seeks to establish a comprehensive assessment program across the largest public education system in the United States, with over 413,000 total students. This article focuses on the principles that have guided the assessment of general education across SUNY…

In "The Other Curriculum: Out-of-Class Experiences Associated with Student Learning and Personal Development," George Kuh (1995) cites numerous benefits associated with a college education, including gains in knowledge, autonomy, social maturation, and personal acceptance; modest gains in verbal and quantitative skills, cognitive complexity,…

While assessment of student learning outcomes has become standard operating procedure on virtually every campus, the driving forces for pursuing assessment remain primarily external. For that to change, campuses must evolve toward a culture of assessment based on the shared values and expectations that arise out of a community. The first step in…

American higher education is being asked to do more with less at a time when more students with different backgrounds, experiences, and expectations are seeking the support they need to improve their personal, professional, and civic lives. Learning communities (LCs) support the success of diverse learners, and learning community literature argues…

Involving graduate teaching assistants (GAs) in the development and implementation of rubrics has many benefits. GA involvement increases their sense of ownership of the rubrics and makes it more likely that they will regard the rubrics in a positive light. GAs have insights about the students whose work will be evaluated by the rubrics; and, as…

Learning communities have been in operation at Temple University (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) since 1993. The goals of the program focus primarily on the creation of stronger social bonds among students as well as enhanced interaction within the classroom. The learning community approach attempts to foster an intellectual environment within which…

The purpose of this article is to provide a snapshot of assessment practices for distance MBA programs in order to help readers gain a better understanding of this landscape. The authors present the findings of a study that they designed which consisted of a nineteen-item on-line questionnaire that surveyed distance MBA providers in regard to…

Counselor educators and students share an ethical accountability for the quality of service that these students will one day provide to their client populations. In this article, the author discusses how assessment can be understood as part of the contract educators make not only with their students, but also with the individuals they will…

This article discusses the Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education (CAS) which celebrated twenty-five years of service, stewardship, and spirit in 2004. CAS is a consortium of thirty-five higher education associations whose directors achieve consensus on the nature and application of standards that guide the work of…