Meeting of the Minds

“Collaboration” – Bresciani et al

            Collaboration is vital to the success of a higher education institution. To purposefully and holistically develop any student, departments need to be working with one another to ensure all needs are being met. It is likely that there may be several obstacles on the road to reaching this level of achievement.

            One of the first barriers mentioned in the book is the mindset that student learning is only achieved in the classroom with faculty. When reading that statement, I was reminded of some of the struggles my chapter went through during my undergrad years. Our campus advisor was receiving negative feedback from professors about Greek men and women being late to class, not focusing, etc. and we needed to take a stance to show that our chapter’s members were not the type of men that would slack off academically. We asked two faculty to become our new chapter advisors and that helped them see all that we do outside of classes. It also gave them information to share with their peers so that the image of Greeks on campus would become more positive.

            I think motivation is an important factor in collaborating, especially with faculty and staff. Both faculty and staff do their job requirements and to go above and beyond, there would need to be some buy-in for them. Personally, motivation comes from personal accounts and relationships and so having students invested in the collaboration too might produce collaboration at a greater frequency.  

"Action Plans and Implementation"

"Implementation" - Bresciani et al 

Reading this chapter reinforced the importance of the learning outcomes and the overall purpose of the assessment that we've been discussing in class. The purpose of an assessment is to answer a question proposed by current literature and the operations of a given department or event. The assessment should aim to “fill the gap” or provide supporting or new knowledge to the given field. Learning outcomes, once created, should also be at the forefront of the planning process as the outcomes and results should confirm or disconfirm the achievement of reaching these.

            Reading all of the processing questions, I was reminded that since I am doing an assessment for a department on campus, I should focus on any and all questions that they have during the data collection and analysis process, not just my own. Keeping the partner in the process as much as possible will not only remind you to reflect upon the purpose of your study and the learning outcomes but also will ensure that you keep a healthy, positive relationship with one another.

            I also really enjoyed looking at an example of a professional development plan. My assessment project was based off of a conference that takes place every two years. One of my hesitations in doing this was that the results found would get lost in the time between analysis and the next conference planning. Seeing how to plan out the time effectively was a great tool I can bring to my campus partner once all data in analyzed.

"Assessment Scholarship Reconsidered" - Keeling et al

      I'm reading this article and being reminded of what Dr. Mahoney was talking about during our first class of the semester. Knowing that after this program, we will all hopefully be in our first professional role within higher education, it is essential that we are prepared to perform an assessment project from start to finish. While some institutions and departments may have their own ways about executing their assessment, there will also be the times where a new program is being implemented and we need to assess its success for future funding or for a shift in focus: that is when we will need to be able to start from stage one.
      It is also very important to have this experience not only in the classroom but also with offices on campus. For my individual project, I was asked to partner with a conference committee with members of the Pacific community. By doing so, I was able to utilize the activities and components of class into practice for this project.
      Looking at the table on page 99, the biggest takeaway I had was under the "Student affairs practice" section. Aligning student activities to the students' development of lifelong skills is exactly why I entered this field. Academic work can teach a student many things; however, cannot place them into a job in their exact field of expertise time and time again. It is the student life side that teaches the transferability of skills and the development of person that will make a higher number of successful graduates.

"Not an end; rather, a beginning"

"Assessment Results Reconsidered" - Keeling et al

        "Building a culture of assessment reflects an orientation towards organizational functioning that is open to discovery, growth, and advancement. No single project defines assessment within an institution; rather, the overall effort towards engaging in critical examination of an institution's practices, outputs, and outcomes in the spirit of of open discovery represents a sea-change in the culture of higher education" (Keeling, 103).  This rings so true to me as I am becoming more involved with the field of higher education and student affairs. Assessment is not by any means an end; rather, it is the beginning of a new cycle as we make sense of that knowledge and put it towards the next task. It is also vital that all departments of the institution are on the same level as far as defining the importance of doing assessment work. One project does not advance the whole office or department, nor does one department's work elevate the work of the entire division. We must all be making constant efforts to assess more and to do more with those results.
      The article questions whether or not assessment is seen as a "fledgling response to external calls for accountability" (Keeling, 105). When competition arises between universities, most departments like to promote the great work that their staff, faculty, and students are accomplishing. To insure that their work is top notch, assessment must be done. This response to the external calls will show a program or department's strengths as well as future projects to strengthen their areas of improvement.

Moving the Campus Forward

“Ethical Assessment and Institutional Advancement: Connecting Good Practice with the Need to Move Campuses Forward” – Finley

“Rather, the challenge with ethics in assessment refers to the nuances of conducting an inquiry about learning and student success within the environment of most postsecondary institutions”. (637). This sentence stuck out to me as I was leading one of the sessions within the conference I was assessing. I, along with another Pacific student, led a caucus on gay and queer men. The session was designed to provide an open space for the sharing of experiences, the successful resources of a campus, and the opportunity to ask questions. A question was raised about the LGBTQIA umbrella and whether or not we glorify certain sub groups and exclude those within our own identity group. It made me reflect on whether or not my evaluations had the same potential glorification due to my experience with certain groups and lack thereof with others. I am glad that I incorporated several open-ended questions in my evaluation for individuals to share their feelings if in fact the glorification was present.

The author also brings up the idea of instances where the identity of the students participating in assessment should be known. She goes on to talk about the learning and living components to collegiate life, along with the academic and social contexts of the student experience. Currently, I have started doing focus groups for my Action Research project, which is focused on the success and retention of the living learning communities here on campus. Some of the students that my partner and I are interviewing are involved within residential life and would be great resources for the office to have moving forward to their intended programs and structure. We were asked; however, to have the participants sign a confidentiality agreement for the sake of the project. I am trying to think of ways to bring these students to light because they felt so passionately about improving the quality of the residential facilities.

Sharing Results v. Respondents

“Ethical Issues” – Schuh and Upcraft

            This article talks about the importance of timing when it comes to sending out an assessment or evaluation. In an effort to get an adequate or “ideal” group of students to respond, the timing of when the assessment is handed out is crucial. For my assessment project, I place the conference evaluation in the program booklet that each participant got when they checked in for the conference. The thought behind it was that they would have their program book with them at all times during the conference; however, with an online application for the conference program and a multi-day conference, it was unlikely that the students would have the evaluation with them upon completion of the conference. It is usually a toss up as to whether or not a paper evaluation will have a higher response rate than an online version.

            The data access is also something that stuck out to me in this article. All of my evaluations were done anonymously; however, those who submitted the completed evaluation could also submit a form to win a raffle prize for completing the form.  I was asked to do my assessment project for a director on campus and it has never been defined what information he wants to have and what information isn’t of interest. We are both also on a committee for the conference that is comprised of over 10 individuals and so there is also grey area there as to what information should and would get passed along to them.

Making the Assessment Personal

“Assessing Attitudes, Values, Dispositions, and Habits of Mind” – Suskie

Assessing someone’s values seemed very easy to do until reading this article. I hadn’t realized how subjective the evaluator is potentially being when asking certain questions. This subjectivity also assumes that the participants all have some common understanding of what is being asked.

I also really appreciated Suskie pointing out the rise of reflection and the benefits of doing it. Sometimes allowing participants to use reflection as their outlet for assessment gives more answers than were expected. When I was an intern for my undergrad’s orientation program, we asked 10 of the 117 OLs to journal their experience from the time of being hired until the contracted ended, a six month commitment. Half of the journalists were newly hired OLs and the other half were returners. Their submissions were sent to my supervisor throughout the summer; their reflections provided our office with much more information on the feelings towards training, staff dynamics, and the takeaways that staff members were getting from this experience. We used their entries more than our formalized assessment when it came to making changed for the next summer.

I think it’s interesting that there was a bullet point to highlight that evaluators should put the option of “I don’t know” or “I can’t answer”. Originally, I saw that as an opt out for participants to finish the survey quickly and not pay attention to the questions; however, now I realize that it is a way for participants to highlights the areas that they are sure of which will give more accurate data in the long run.