Engaging Student Stakeholders in Developing a Learning Outcomes Assessment Framework

Learning outcomes assessment and alignment contribute to the transparency, quality, and progression of a program. We set forth a learning outcomes framework that aligns learning outcomes at the course, major, program, and university levels. Senior undergraduate students were recruited to analyze assessments from eight core courses required for Molecular and Cellular Biology (MCB) majors at the University of Guelph. This analysis was conducted to achieve two goals: (a) to develop tools to assess learning outcomes in the MCB Department, and (b) to incorporate insights shared by the student perspective. Almost 1,600 Individual questions and their attributes were coded, compiled, and linked into the learning outcomes framework. The students then connected the questions to course concepts and assigned a cognitive domain indicated by Bloom’s Taxonomy level. After training and calibration, two undergraduate students evaluated all questions in the eight core courses with an average of 93.2% ± 1.6% (n=8) agreement between evaluators. These data were used to generate assessment profiles for individual courses and as an aggregate to provide insights regarding the program. This work makes constructive use the learning outcomes framework and illustrates the importance of leveraging undergraduate student perspectives in discussions of learning outcomes in higher education

Aligning Assessments as a Process in Program Evaluation

Assessment and learning outcome alignment contributes to the transparency, quality and progression of a program. In this presentation, we will share a process used to evaluate the alignment of assessments with both course content and the learning outcomes framework. This framework links learning outcomes at each level of the institution, from individual courses to majors, programs, and the university. We can use this framework in online settings to collect data at each learning outcome level. The pilot project at the University of Guelph will show how this data analysis can guide discussions about the improvement of program curriculum by exposing misalignments

Intention and Perception: Designing questions for online assessments.

During the session participants will be guided through a process to develop and evaluate assessment components that target higher order cognitive skills. Building on this base, participants will engage in a process of creating new questions that align with the learning outcomes (LO) for a course. As a group, we will discuss online quizzes and how we can embrace their unique characteristics while designing questions. Itinerary: I. Relationship between LO and assessment and its significance Activity 1: Recognizing misalignment. II. Question alignment Progress from creation to reflection to revision III. The online perspective Discussion: Characteristics of an online quiz Transitioning current assessments to the online setting Embracing these traits in question design Activity 2: Create a question that aligns with a given CLO, reflect and revise. Discuss