The George Mason University (Mason) offices responsible for institutional reporting and assessment were merged to strengthen and solidify their functions and expertise. The organizational structure creating the Office of Institutional Effectiveness and Planning (OIEP) was intended to engineer a new paradigm where assessment would inform the…

In October of 2019, I presented at the IUPUI Assessment Institute in Indianapolis on the topic of academic program review. While almost every campus conducts program reviews, the definition, purpose, structure, and integration of assessment in program reviews is not universally understood, accepted, or implemented. This paper summarizes essential…

As program-level assessment increasingly becomes an integral part of the higher-education landscape, so does the debate regarding the efficacy of current assessment methods. Traditionally, students do not participate in assessment--neither of their own learning nor of institutional or program efficacy. Our assessment process presents an…

Writing is complex, and assessment of writing is equally complex, particularly when considering the need to measure outcomes at the institutional level while providing meaningful data that informs curriculum reform and supports learning at the discipline-level. Using a multi-layered assessment that incorporates standardized measures of writing…

This paper describes criteria used to evaluate the effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability of outcomes-based program review. The criteria were generated from a grounded theory analysis of thirteen institutions whose faculty and administrators have been practicing outcomes-based program review from seven to thirty-two years. Examples of the…

Programme evaluation is essential for quality assurance in education. In this paper, we describe our evaluation strategy for the first year of a new medical programme. Although we used multiple methods in the evaluation, the use of the focus group method was core. This paper reports our experiences of focus groups for this purpose. We describe the…

Assessment of educational effectiveness provides vitally important feedback to Institutions of Higher Education. It also provides important information to external stakeholders, such as prospective students, parents, governmental and local regulatory entities, professional and regional accrediting organizations, and representatives of the…

As more institutions of higher education engage in the practice of leadership education, the effective assessment of these efforts lags behind due to a variety of factors. Without an intentional assessment plan, leadership educators are liable to make one or more of several common errors in assessing their programs and activities. This article…

The purpose of this study was to determine the use and perceived usefulness of outcomes assessment methods in health information management programs. Additional characteristics of the outcomes assessment practices were recognized. The findings were evaluated for significant differences in results based on age of the program, type of institution,…

This practical guide to outcomes-based assessment in student affairs is designed to help readers meet the growing demand for accountability and for demonstrating student learning. The authors offer a framework for implementing the assessment of student learning and development and pragmatic advice on the strategies most appropriate for the…

Universidade Aberta (UAb), being a distance teaching university, is particularly suited to tackle some of the recommendations concerning the assurance of accessibility to education expressed in the "Education and Training 2010" goals. Meanwhile, the University's strategic plan for 2006/2010 decided to implement a fully virtual innovative…

In its plan to combat the PhD shortage crisis, the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business International (AACSB; 2003) has called for the development of PhD program rankings to serve as incentives for academic institutions to invest more in PhD programs, thereby counterbalancing the disproportionate influence of master of business…

Oregon State University (OSU) is located in Corvallis, a community of 53,000 people situated in the heart of the Willamette Valley between Portland and Eugene. Approximately 15,700 undergraduate and 3,400 graduate students, including 2,600 U.S. students of color and 950 international students, are currently enrolled at OSU across 11 academic…

Paradise Valley Community College (PVCC), located in Phoenix, Arizona, is part of the Maricopa County Community College District (MCCCD). PVCC was founded in 1987 and in the fall of 2007 served 8,739 students in credit courses. Since 1997, PVCC has been on a quest to become a "more learning centered" college. As a result of placing…

California State University, Sacramento, commonly referred to as "Sacramento State," is a booming metropolitan university located on 300 acres in the state capital of California. The university, the seventh largest in the California State University system, enrolls a multicultural student body of approximately 29,000 students. At…