2013-2014 Annual Program Assessment Report

Please submit report to your department chair or program coordinator, the Associate Dean of your College, and to [email protected], director of assessment and program review, by Tuesday, September 30, 2014. You may submit a separate report for each program which conducted assessment activities.

College: Humanities

Department: Linguistics/TESL

Program: MA in Linguistics

Assessment liaison: Tineke Scholten

1. Overview of Annual Assessment Project(s). Provide a brief overview of this year’s assessment plan and process.

In accordance with a 5-year plan for assessment, the Linguistics/TESL Department set out to evaluate to what extent MA-LING students are able to “read, analyze, and critically evaluate linguistic research, demonstrating a high level of critical thinking and problem solving about linguistic issues.” (SLO4) A plan for data collection was developed during the first Linguistics/TESL Advisory Committee meeting in the Fall of 2013. Data were subsequently collected and evaluated from one of the core seminars in the MA-LING curriculum: LING 610 (Seminar in Syntax) in Spring 2014.

2. Assessment Buy-In. Describe how your chair and faculty were involved in assessment related activities. Did department meetings include discussion of student learning assessment in a manner that included the department faculty as a whole?

Assessment is a regular item on the agenda of the Linguistics Advisory Committee. The Assessment Liaison generally initiates the discussion related to that part of assessment that involves the annual data collection and evaluation and all members of the committee weigh in on how to execute the data collection and analysis for any given year. All faculty, including the Chair and part time faculty, participate willingly in the execution of the annual assessment process. Assessment (whether driven by the annual data collection or based on anecdotal data from the teaching experiences of faculty) is a vital part of almost every Linguistics Advisory Committee meeting and has prompted numerous curricular and other changes over the past years. Assessment has taken a particularly prominent role during this academic year as faculty actively participated in the Self Study process for the Department’s Program Review.

1 3. Student Learning Outcome Assessment Project. Answer items a-f for each SLO assessed this year. If you assessed an additional SLO, copy and paste items a-f below, BEFORE you answer them here, to provide additional reporting space.

3a. Which Student Learning Outcome was measured this year?

As mentioned above, the Department measured MA-LING SLO4: Students will be able to read, analyze, and critically evaluate linguistic research, demonstrating a high level of critical thinking and problem solving about linguistic issues. (SLO4)

3b. Does this learning outcome align with one or more of the university’s Big 5 Competencies? (Delete any which do not apply) Reaching this SLO requires the student to have competencies in the following areas:  Critical Thinking  Written Communication  Information Literacy

3c. What direct and/or indirect instrument(s) were used to measure this SLO? A graded term paper, the culminating experience in the course, was used to assess students’ abilities relative to SLO4. A rubric, designed for the purpose was used to evaluate the results. The course instructor rated the students’ work relative to this rubric.

3d. Describe the assessment design methodology: For example, was this SLO assessed longitudinally (same students at different points) or was a cross-sectional comparison used (Comparing freshmen with seniors)? If so, describe the assessment points used.

Students take LING 610 at varying points on their path towards their degree. Due to the lack of cohorts, a longitudinal or cross-sectional comparison is not feasible. The choice of material for evaluation was based on its relevance to this particular SLO.

3e. Assessment Results & Analysis of this SLO: Provide a summary of how the results were analyzed and highlight findings from the collected evidence.

2 The data were rated according to a rubric specifying the skills expressed in SLO4. All term papers in LING 610 were evaluated, amounting to a total of 16. The results were as follows:

Criteria Possible Average % Points Score score Introducing main ideas: The student clearly conveys a central claim/central question or idea. 4 2.94 73.44 Development of ideas/argument: The student’s discussion/analysis is cohesive, demonstrating solid 4 2.94 73.44 linguistic reasoning. Effective use of supporting data: The student supports his/her claims by introducing relevant language 4 2.94 73.44 data where needed. Formatting of language data: The student’s presentation of data in the text largely follows APA/LSA style 4 3.19 79.69 requirements. (Use of glosses, layout, quotation marks around citation forms, etc.) Writing mechanics: The student’s writing meets college level requirements in terms of spelling, 4 3.19 79.69 punctuation, paragraph structure, etc.

These results did not meet the 80% benchmark specified in the 5 Year Program Assessment Plan. Faculty discussed these results in their fall 2014 meeting. The faculty was confirmed in their opinion that the MA in Linguistics does not currently provide enough opportunities for students to develop their ability to critically evaluate and discuss linguistic data. The Department plans to propose a curriculum modification this academic year.

3f. Use of Assessment Results of this SLO: Describe how assessment results were used to improve student learning. Were assessment results from previous years or from this year used to make program changes in this reporting year? (Possible changes include: changes to course content/topics covered, changes to course sequence, additions/deletions of courses in program, changes in pedagogy, changes to student advisement, changes to student support services, revisions to program SLOs, new or revised assessment instruments, other academic programmatic changes, and changes to the assessment plan.)

As mentioned above, these data corroborate the faculty’s belief that the MA in Linguistics would benefit from a curriculum revision. The addition of several post graduate courses to the curriculum over the past years has made this a more feasible task.

3 4. Assessment of Previous Changes: Present documentation that demonstrates how the previous changes in the program resulted in improved student learning.

This is the first year that Linguistics/TESL department has expanded its annual data collection and evaluation to their MA Programs.

5. Changes to SLOs? Please attach an updated course alignment matrix if any changes were made. (Refer to the Curriculum Alignment Matrix Template, http://www.csun.edu/assessment/forms_guides.html.)

No changes took place over the past academic year.

6. Assessment Plan: Evaluate the effectiveness of your 5 year assessment plan. How well did it inform and guide your assessment work this academic year? What process is used to develop/update the 5 year assessment plan? Please attach an updated 5 year assessment plan for 2013-2018. (Refer to Five Year Planning Template, plan B or C, http://www.csun.edu/assessment/forms_guides.html.)

The 5-year assessment plan is a useful template to ensure that the department assesses all its SLOs within a 5 year period. This year’s assessment followed the newly developed assessment plan. The current 5-year plan has been attached to this report.

7. Has someone in your program completed, submitted or published a manuscript which uses or describes assessment activities in your program? Please provide citation or discuss.

8. Other information, assessment or reflective activities or processes not captured above.

The development and spearheading of annual assessment of now three programs (BA, MA-TESL and MA-LING) have added considerably to the workload of the assessment liaison, a workload that is not commensurate with the financial compensation currently provided by the College. Moreover, while part time faculty graciously agrees to partake in rating data for the purpose of assessment, the budget of the Department does unfortunately not allow compensation for these efforts.