Assessment Now

Assessment Now Improvement Committee Destination Complete: (UOAIC). This committee, represented A Review of the Title by members of all academic and support III Grant units, will manage the incorporation of the goals of the grant into the routine By Chad May, Director operations of the University to assure Office of Institutional Research sustainability. Some highlights of the and Assessment work done by the UOAIC have been a review of 33 academic program February 2016 As the Title III, Part A, SIP grant assessment plans and 15 educational program, Strengthening Assessment of support and administrative units. These reviews have increased the skill level at Student Learning and Institutional Effectiveness, has come to a close, we which current faculty/staff can design Office of Institutional Research wanted to say a big Thank You to all at and evaluate assessment plans and and Assessment the University who helped to make the reports for their respective areas and we Holy Family Hall Room 106 grant a success and know that have increased the quality of assessment assessment and data-informed decisions plans being brought forward to the Chad May, 341-3214 are all of our jobs. The grant has had a committee. Five faculty assessment Director great impact on our University and its coordinators (FACs), who were each ability to fulfill the goals of the trained on various components of the Lisa Belfield, 341-3621 legislation as well as our own goals and Blackboard Outcomes Assessment Associate Director objectives. The grant has enabled us to system, have spearheaded this work so well that now assessment is embedded build capacity for the University to into each academic school and unit. The Kymber Taylor, 341-3242 establish a comprehensive and FACs had the opportunity to attend the Research Analyst sustainable assessment process for both Assessment Institute Annual conference academic programs, and administrative at Indiana University – Purdue Cheryl Glover, 341-3614 and educational support units that has University Indianapolis Research Assistant developed and improved academic and co/extra-curricular programs at the (IUPUI). Additionally, we have developed documentation and training University. In addition, this materials for the FACs as a reference strengthened assessment process in guide when assisting other members of Cheryl Glover, administrative and educational support their Divisions. We appreciate the hard Research Assistant units has improved institutional Page 3 - Meet the new work that the FACs put into making management and fiscal stability as units members of the OIRA Staff, assessment a reality at the University use data and information to make Lisa Belfield and Kymber and all that they accomplished during decisions more effectively. In the last Taylor. four annual performance reports we the early implementation period. Over reported on laying the groundwork for the life of the grant over 20 faculty and Page 4 – BOOK REVIEW, moving the University towards a more staff have attended many workshops, Managing Technology in fully actualized culture of assessment conferences, and meetings on Higher Education by A.W. (or a culture of evidence). In this fifth assessment in higher education and in Tony Bates and Albert Sangrà year of the grant we continued to build fact at least eight faculty and staff have on the momentum achieved in the first presented at least once at one of those Page 5 – Summer and Fall four years and achieved all of the meetings to discuss their efforts in 2015 Assessment Conference milestones set in the grant application. assessing their academic or Report We have achieved all of the administrative programs. goals/objectives originally set in the grant and more. A summary of some of We continue to use the three step process to plan, report, and document the accomplishments and tasks we have improvement initiatives, and co-located completed in the fifth-year of the grant all of those documents along with prior program includes the following: reports within a Program Assessment We have fully implemented the Organization within Blackboard for University Outcomes Assessment and sharing of those documents with colleagues. Together, these 2 accomplishments demonstrate the their activities, both Schools have action dynamic aspects of academic program plans guiding their work for the next management and Holy Family’s year or two. 2015-16 University commitment to its mission. We have continued to produce an assessment We have also made tremendous Fact Book newsletter called Assessment Now, as progress with administrative and Available Online well as, offering the monthly lunch-and- educational support units (student learn program to share what is being activities, residence life, counseling, done in various areas in regards to the career center, etc.) in moving to assessment process and outcomes. systematic and cyclical assessment processes. All student life areas have We had full implementation of the new assessment plans and are collecting data course evaluation form and process that and beginning to use that data to make led to a report to academic and faculty process and program improvements. leaders that showed positive outcomes of this new form and process. Due to As mentioned in a number of the grant funds, staff were able to launch metrics within this annual performance the full-scale implementation of that report, the grant has been able to help new form and process to provide a the University become more financially better measure of instructor self-sufficient with an increase in net performance through this student- assets this grant year, as well as make feedback system. With this new system many improvements in its academic Holy Family University Fact Book we were able to do a full-year analysis offerings. of effective pedagogical practices and The University Fact Book is available provide academic areas benchmarks As most know, we are switching on the OIRA page in Blackboard. Select within their own areas so that Learning Management Systems from My Organizations, OIRA-Internal instructors can see how they compare to Blackboard to Canvas; with this change Resources, University Fact Books 2015- others within and outside of their we are also selecting a new Assessment 16. It contains 90 pages of comparative department and school. This has been Management System. Given all of the data and information about Holy Family well received and future analyses will work over the last five years and how from fall 2011 to fall 2015. The Fact continue to be conducted. much more mature our program and Book is saved as a PDF, however, unit level assessment process is now, we individual pages or the entire document We continued to support the mini-grant are poised to transition smoothly to a may be printed. Previous copies of the program for faculty who proposed new technological tool that will make Fact Book are also available on activities for strengthening their ability the process more efficient and even Blackboard. Printed copies are available to apply assessment tools in their easier to embed into the daily activities upon request. subject areas. These activities included of our academic programs and faculty and administrators from across educational and administrative support The School Facts & Figures are being the University. The results of these units. Please watch the newsletter for compiled and should be available soon. mini-grants have been very successful at more information and articles about this Each contains information specific to spurring creativity and ratcheting up the significant change and milestone for the the School, They will also be on knowledge base needed to strengthen University. It is certainly an exciting Blackboard. the University’s assessment efforts. time for Holy Family University. This has also proven very helpful in Fact Book Table of Contents Section I: Fall Enrollment and Student building collegiality in this process which is essential to the success of the Characteristics grant program. Two mini-grants were Section II: Undergraduate and Graduate granted over the summer of 2015 and Admissions Section III: Academic Program Trends both the School of Education and School of Nursing used the mini-grant Section IV: Organization (Faculty, funds to improve their students test- Staff, and Finance Data) taking skills; one did so by coming up with a plan to provide more support for the state-wide teacher certification tests, while the other provided workshops on test design to improve the testing going on in individual courses. As a result of 3 Provides support and guidance to We hope the entire campus community members of the campus community will have the opportunity to work and NEW OIRA STAFF in the development, administration, get to know her in the coming months. and reporting of internal Her responsibilities will include: surveys/questionnaires using the Survey Software, Qualtrics. Assisting in all areas of institutional Assist the OIRA team in supporting research and assessment, administrative and support units in specifically focusing on assessment their conduct of assessment issues and activities planning, implementation, and use Assisting of results. schools/divisions/department in creating, documenting and Lisa Belfield, Ed.D, Associate improving their assessment plans & Director activities Assisting in developing methods We are very excited to announce that for tracking and managing all Lisa Belfield joined our team on assessment activity using the December 14th as

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