NASPAA Assessment Workshop: The Next Steps

1. NASPAA Assessment Workshop: The Next Steps National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

2. Part B: How does the program know how well its students are meeting faculty expectations for learning on the required (or other) competencies? • The program is expected to engage in ongoing assessment of student learning for all universal required competencies, all mission-specific required competencies, and all elective (option, track, specialization, or concentration) competencies. The program does not need to assess student learning for every student, on every competency, every semester. However, the program should have a written plan for assessing each competency on a periodic basis, at least once during the accreditation period. This plan should be available to the COPRA site visit team. Standard 5 : Part BSelf Study Instructions National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

3. Stages of Assessment National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

4. Types of Measures: Direct vs Indirect Direct Measures: Provide for the direct examination or observation of student knowledge or skills against measurable performance criteria. Indirect Measures: Ascertain the opinion or self-report of the extent or value of learning experiences. National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

5. Types of Measures: Direct vs Indirect Direct Measures: Refers to actual student work, such as reports, comprehensive exams, presentations, memos, papers, journals, etc. Indirect Measures: Refers to student (or alumni / employer) opinion about what the student learned via surveys, exit interviews, focus groups, etc. National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

6. The program demonstrates evidence of student attainment of the expected learning outcomes for the universal required competencies described in the self-study. (The SVT has auditing authority at NASPAA and may review any of the required universal competencies). The program shows that it collects direct evidence of student learning and analyzes the evidence in terms of faculty expectations. If the results of assessment do not meet faculty expectations, the program shows how it has used the results of assessment for program change to improve student learning. The standards require programs to collect direct measures of student learning Standard 5 Part C:Basis for Judgment Programs should “close the loop” by using assessment results. National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

7. Examples: Direct and Indirect Measures DIRECT MEASURES Homework Exams/Comps Projects, papers Case study analysis Thesis, oral exam Grant application Presentation Internship evaluation Journals, memos Classroom exercises Pre-post data Capstone, portfolio INDIRECT MEASURES Surveys exit interviews Advisory Bd meetings Focus groups, employers Faculty meetings Job placement review Review of syllabi Course grades Student awards received National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

8. Example: Using Homework as a Direct Measure • Homework assignments may test multiple skills or multiple concepts therefore: • Know what student learning outcome is being measured • Know where in the assignment the students should demonstrate the mastery of the outcome • Have a rubric to determine level of mastery • E.g.: A short paper in a statistics course could measure the student’s ability to manage data, select appropriate statistical techniques, and interpret findings. National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

9. Analyzing the Evidence • Once you have chosen your measure what does the program think is an acceptable level of performance? National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

10. Analyzing the Evidence Once you have chosen your measure, you must gather a sample of student work for analysis of student performance by a faculty group. National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

11. Setting Performance Expectations Expectation for performance often takes the form of a rubric that identifies low, acceptable, and outstanding levels of performance. Faculty set expectations, e.g., all students will score at least acceptable National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

12. Closing the Loop • Once you have selected student work and analyzed it against expectations, • How are you feeding that information back to make programmatic improvements? National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

13. Programs should have evidence available documenting how they are conducting their assessment of the competencies, such as: • Assessment Plan • Logic Model • Rubrics • Curriculum Mapping • Examples of Student Capstone projects/ Comp Exams • Minutes from Faculty meetings where results of assessment were discussed to make programmatic improvements Documenting for SVT/ COPRA National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration

14. Not every competency every year • Sampling • Making it Meaningful and Manageable Sustainability National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration