This year’s featured keynote speakers were Charles Blaich, Director, Center of Inquiry at Wabash College and the Higher Education Data Sharing Consortium (HEDS) and Kathleen Wise, Associate Director, Center of Inquiry. They presented “Between the rock and the hard place: Lessons from practitioners who’ve navigated external demands and internal resistance to improve student learning.”
Driven by regional and specialized accreditors, state and federal government, foundations, and other external stake-holders; assessment is now a fact of life. Even though there are many assessment skeptics among our colleagues, external demands for quality assurance continue to push our departments, schools, and programs to assess their impact. Yet, even as these outside forces lead/push our institutions to assess, there are practitioners who choose to lead assessment efforts at their institutions not to comply with external demands, but because they see assessment as an opportunity to improve student learning. In this session, we will review the obstacles these assessment leaders encounter and the strategies they use to try and make assessment matter as much for their students as it does for meeting the requirements of external stakeholders.
The conference attendees’ feedback on the keynote was overwhelmingly positive. The audience appreciated the “thought provoking ideas on how to enhance and frame assessment practices” and the reminder that “effective assessment requires conversation.” Their shared insight on assessment was appreciated by all.
Other presentations included:
Automating Data Collection and Reporting to Promote Faculty Engagement in Assessment presented by Dr. Frederick Burrack and Chris Urban of Kansas State University
How an Assessment Framework Helped Revitalize Program Review at JCCC presented by Bill Robinson and Dr. Sheri Barrett of Johnson County Community College
Utilizing a Concept Inventory to Facilitate Data Driven Course Improvement presented by Heather M. Seitz of Johnson County Community College
Establishing a Culture of Assessment in Student Affairs by Kevin W. Joseph of University of Kansas
Gaining a Greater Understanding of Embedded Core Skills in the Content of General Education Courses presented by a panel from Emporia State University
Assessment and Campus-Wide Engagement: Incorporating a Center for Teaching and Learning presented by a panel from Kansas City Kansas Community College
Assessment Across the Liberal Arts presented by Christina Wills and Robert Vigliotti of Rockhurst University
A Student Learning Outcomes Assessment Journey: From Concept through Dissertation presented by Jane Zaccardi
Dr. Josie Welsh presented at the pre-conference on Thursday, May 4: Strategies for Sustainable Co-curricular Assessment, Strategies presentation
Dr. Sheri Barrett and Melissa Giese also presented at the pre- conference on Thursday, May 4: Asking the Right Question, the Key to Good Assessment
