terry rhodes: show me the learning: valid assessment of learning in undergraduate education (value)

Show Me the Learning: Valid Assessment of Learning in Undergraduate Education

(VALUE)

Terrel L. RhodesAssociation of American Colleges and

UniversitiesWASC Resource Fair

January 2012

Survey Results Are Consistent

Everyone – business, policy makers, faculty, students - wants better learning AND

better information, compelling evidence on what students know and are able to do…

whether for personal development, program assessment, accreditation or

hiring a new employee.

Major VALUE Project Activities

• National advisory board [12 members]• Rubric collection and creation of 15

metarubrics by teams [over 100 individual faculty and others]

• Piloting and refining metarubrics through three cycles of leadership campus use (using e-portfolios of student work [over 100 campuses, including 12 leadership campuses]

• Final reliability and ease-of-use check with national panel of 40 academics, employers, teachers, community members

Outcomes for the development of

metarubrics:• Inquiry and analysis • Critical thinking • Creative thinking • Written communication • Oral communication • Quantitative literacy • Information literacy• Reading • Teamwork • Problem solving • Civic knowledge and engagement—local and

global • Intercultural knowledge and competence • Ethical reasoning and action • Foundations and skills for lifelong learning • Integrative learning

Commonalities among rubrics

Motivated by: Need for among-campus communicationMobile students, transferBelief that, in spite of uniqueness, core outcomes are shared

Rubrics Basics

Criteria

VALUE Rubrics & AssessmentVALUE Rubrics & Assessment

Rubrics Basics

Levels

VALUE Rubrics & AssessmentVALUE Rubrics & Assessment

Rubrics Basics

Performance Descriptors

VALUE Rubrics & AssessmentVALUE Rubrics & Assessment

Validity and Usability• Over 3000 distinct institutions have downloaded one

or more of the VALUE rubrics for use since fall 2010• Over 11,000 distinct individuals have downloaded one

or more of the VALUE rubrics for use• 3 major consortia are using VALUE rubrics for cross

institutional collaboration – Connect2Learning – LaGuardia College/AAEEBL (FIPSE) – 23 campuses; Integrative Portfolio Process – Michigan (FIPSE) – 6 campuses; RAILS – Syracuse (Institute for Museum and Library Studies ACRL) – 10 campuses

Reliability Study• 40 Faculty• 4 Traditional Disciplinary Divisions –

Humanities, Social Sciences, STEM, Professions

• Three VALUE rubrics – Critical Thinking, Civic Engagement, Integrative Learning

• Common set of student portfolio work• Agreement = .66 without norming; .8

normed• Another set of 5 campuses, using same set

of rubrics with 500 samples of student work – still analyzing

Building the Evidentiary Base

• University of Kansas – Representing Results

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Critical Thinking: Issues, Analysis, and Conclusions

Inter-rater reliability = >.8

Building the Evidentiary Base

• University of Kansas – Representing Results

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Critical Thinking: Evaluation of Sources and Evidence

Building the Evidentiary Base - Kansas

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“VALUE added” for 4 years - writing

Building the Evidentiary Base

• University of Kansas – • “analysis of the data from the AACU VALUE rubrics

affirmed that a team approach to course design can yield larger improvement in some forms of student writing and thinking”

• “We also saw that the rubrics work best when there is close alignment between the nature of the assignment and the dimensions of intellectual skill described in the rubric”

• “Finally, at a practical level we are very encouraged that this process is manageable and sustainable”

Roanoke College

Writing

Reliability = >.8

Using the Results“…we excluded the scores for those instructors and ran

frequencies and descriptive statistics on the categories again. We found the means for the rubric categories of Focus and Thesis and Organization remained close to 2.5 with the scores of 2 and 3 occurring most often (approx. 2.4) while most scores for the categories of Evidence and Reasoning were 2s. The category of Style and Mechanics was in the middle with a mean of 2.3. Our adjusted results support what most faculty believe about the writing of our first-year students, they can learn to develop a thesis and organize a paper more effectively than they can provide convincing evidence and strong reasoning to support the thesis.”

Building the Evidentiary Base

University of North Carolina - Wilmington

Dimension % of Work Products Scored 2 or higher

% of Work Products Scored 3 or Higher

IL1 Determine Information Needed 87.2% 46.2%

IL2 Access Needed Information 89.6% 46.8%

IL3 Evaluate Information and Sources 88.5% 39.7%

IL4 Use Information Effectively 85.9% 43.6%

IL5 Access and Use Information Ethically 93.6% 59.0%

Table 1. Information Literacy Results

Table 1 Information Literacy ResultsTable 1 Information Literacy ResultsTable 1 Information Literacy Results

Inter-rater reliability = >.8

Alverno CollegeVideo of oral presentations

First year and last year

Carleton CollegeSophomore portfolio

In the disciplines

Dissemination• Dozens of presentations at accreditation and assessment conferences (US and abroad) and workshops• Two issues (winter 2009, winter 2011/12) of Peer Review on VALUE rubrics = 9,200 each, 1200 institutions• Two Publications: 1) Rubrics = 6500+; 2)e-Portfolios = 2800+ since early 2010 (about to be a book from Jossey-Bass)• Virtually all vendors of e-portfolio software products have adopted VALUE rubrics• Degree Qualifications Profile [DQP] (Lumina)• Being used worldwide, e.g. Japan, Hong Kong, Australia, United Arab Emirates, Korea• Major state university systems are using VALUE rubrics

Contacts

Terrel L Rhodes, AAC&U Vice Presidentrhodes@aacu.org

http://www.aacu.org/value