Guidelines for Completing Annual Assessment Report for General Education

St. Cloud State University

Spring 2007

General information

Ø This form should be used only to report assessment activity for the 2006-07 academic year for General Education. This form should be submitted only by departments that have assessed one or more General Education courses in the past year. If your department has not conducted General Education assessment, do not submit the form. 

Ø Forms should be submitted electronically (as e-mail attachments) to your college assessment director.

Ø Reports are primarily for the use of the program. They should be disseminated among and discussed by program faculty in an effort to identify ways to improve the program and assessment methods. College assessment directors will provide summary information from the reports to the University Assessment Director, who will use this information in preparing the annual institutional assessment report. These reports also will be made available to the General Education Assessment Director when that position is filled. Assessment reports will be kept on file by the Assessment Office. It will use these reports in two ways: (1) as data to be analyzed for the purpose of improving assessment and assessment reporting at SCSU and (2) as an archive to preserve for the program and its reviewers a record of assessment methods, tools, findings, and uses.  

Ø If you have questions, please contact the SCSU Assessment office at 80133 or 96590.

Information pertaining to specific parts of the form

Ø Key learning outcomes assessed this year – Type in the full text of each learning outcome that was assessed.

Ø Where did you assess this outcome? – In which course or courses did the assessment take place?

Ø Assessment methods and tools – What specific tool or method was used to measure student learning? Examples might include an assignment, a test question, a portfolio, or a standardized test.

Ø Assessment tools attached? – Attach the instrument used to measure student learning, and indicate here that the tool is attached. Examples of such tools might include a rubrics or test questions.

Ø Key assessment findings – Describe the results of the assessment activities. Are the student learning outcomes that were assessed being adequately met? Do the findings raise questions that should be addressed by General Education faculty? In order to stay under the word limit, it may not be possible to describe all of the findings. Focus on the most important results. If you have data summaries (graphs, charts, tables), please attach them. (These do not count toward the word limit.)

Ø Use of assessment results – (1) Describe the meetings in which faculty discussed the assessment findings. (Who met? How often? How long? What was discussed? What decisions were made?) (2) Describe any efforts by faculty this year to improve student learning or the assessment of student learning based on General Education assessment activities. Because improvement of student learning is the ultimate goal of assessment, please include as much detail as possible (within the word limit) in your description.

Ø Planning for the next academic year – Follow the same instructions as were provided above for the current year. Which General Education outcomes do you plan to assess in the coming academic year? Where or how will you assess these outcomes? Which methods or tools you use? Attach the assessment tools you will use.