Assessment Planning

The program assessment planning process is related to the following TCB UK Accreditation Criteria:

• TCB UK Criteria 2: Program Educational Objectives

• TCB UK Criteria 3: Student Outcomes

• TCB UK Criteria 4: Continuous Improvement

Establish Purpose and Set Goals

Institutional Mission Statement

Assessment planning begins with the institutional mission statement which describes the communities that are served and the institutional purposes and other characteristics that define the institution.

Develop a Timeline

Each assessment leader, along with any pertinent faculty or administration should develop a plan of action and timeline to ensure departmental goals are met in a timely fashion.

Define and Refine Objectives and Outcomes

Program Educational Objectives

Program Educational Objectives are broad statements that describe the career and professional accomplishments that the program is preparing graduates to achieve. These objectives should be assessed and evaluated periodically, where this is generally done through alumni, employer, recruiter, and/or advisory board assessment. The objectives should be evaluated on a systematic basis to determine their continued relevance to the needs of constituents.

Student Outcomes

Student outcomes are succinct statements that describe what students are expected to know and be able to do by the time of graduation. These outcomes relate to skills, knowledge and behaviours that students acquire as they progress through the program.

Student outcomes should be defined in order for faculty to have a common understanding of the expectations for student learning and to achieve consistency across the curriculum, as measured by performance indicators. Performance indicators represent the knowledge, skills, attitudes or behaviour students should be able to demonstrate by the time of graduation that indicate competence related to the outcome.

Design and Conduct Assessments

Educational Practices and Strategies

Understanding the alignment between educational practices and strategies promotes efficient and effective assessment practices. This can be accomplished by mapping educational strategies (which could include co-curricular activities) to learning outcomes.

Data Collection

Strategies for data collection and analysis need to be systematic and consistent that focus on assessment related to the performance indicators.

Evaluate Assessment Findings

Evaluation is the process that is used to determine the meaning of the assessment results. This includes the implications of assessment results related to program effectiveness and recommendations for improvement in areas of weaknesses. Evaluation should include those who can implement improvement strategies.

Use Results for Decision Making

The feedback process is critical to creating and maintaining a systematic quality assurance system. When successfully implemented, all elements of the quality assurance process interact with one another.