Assessment:
Targets and Goals
Gail Matthews-DeNatale, Ph.D.
Northeastern University
What is Assessment?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/timsnell/2425782551
Characteristics
Goal-Oriented
Intentional
Systematic
Data-Driven
The Cycle
Identify
Scope
Interpret
Data
Share &
Act Upon
Findings
Form
Research
Question
Design &
Implement
Research
Why are you
interested?
Impetus
Impetus
Form: Improve
Sum: Evaluate
Act: Advocate
Several of the Above?
What do you
want to assess?
Target
Partners and Allies
Who can you enlist
to help design and
implement the
assessment?
Typical Starting Point
http://www.flickr.com/photos/adventuresinlibrarianship/3388157495
What, specifically,
do you want to
assess?
Refine
Scope
Impact of X On …
Cost
Retention
Satisfaction
Learning Outcomes
etc.
What, specifically,
specifically, do
you want to
assess?
Refine
Narrow the Parameters
What do you mean by X?
Working with what population?
Under what conditions?
With what excellence criteria?
Core Question
When we do X,
using Y approach,
what happens to
the outcome of Z?
Example: Media Literacy
What is it?
What does it mean to achieve it?
What are we doing to further it?
What does student work look like now?
Media Literacy: Parameters
What is it?
What does it mean
to achieve it?
What are we doing
to further it?
What does student
work look like now?
Core Question Before
How is the digital
storytelling project
going?
Remember This?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/adventuresinlibrarianship/3388157495
Core Question After
When we incorporate
digital storytelling into
undergraduate seminars,
what happens to those
students’ media literacy
abilities?
Media Literacy: Partners
Communications
Library
Computer Science
Academic Technology
Advisory Group
First Year Seminar
IR
Who can we enlist
to help design and
implement the
assessment?
What About You?
Impetus?
What?
Why?
With Whom?
Core Question?