Educational Assessment, Evaluation, and Research Commons^™

Honing In On What To Measure, Kristen Mckinney

Assessment in Action Conference

Institutional and departmental outcomes are framed in necessarily broad terms as we articulate the key values and goals of our work. Bridging the gap between those broad outcomes and more tailored and measurable program and service specific outcomes can be difficult. This session will present some ideas and strategies for developing outcomes and guide participants through the process of drafting outcomes for their own programs.

Assessment As Ally: Focusing On What Matters, Gloria Rogers

Assessment in Action Conference

Too many times, the assessment of student learning becomes an exercise of futility where faculty time is squandered and the result is many data and no information that is useful for the improvement of student learning. When properly understood and implemented, the assessment process can provide meaningful results that inform faculty about the achievement of outcomes, the alignment of the curriculum, and what can be done to improve student learning. Topics which will be discussed are the importance of well‐defined outcomes, curriculum mapping, the development of systematic processes, and reporting results for action.

Faculty Achievements, April 2017, Otterbein University

Faculty Achievement Reports

No abstract provided.

Bba Quantitative Skills: Assessing The Prerequisites, Matthew Ross, A. Michelle Wright

Assessment Grants

We examine determinants of prerequisite quantitative skill among Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) students. Preliminary results suggest that undergraduate students are deficient in quantitative skills, even among a sample of finance students whom show greater quantitative ability than the mean BBA student. Mean math quiz performance among 164 student participants substantially lags faculty established expectations. We extend beyond traditional BBA pedagogy research by incorporating the Attitudes Toward Mathematics Inventory (ATMI) and language analysis in a business finance context. We find strong evidence for learning theory explanations involving quantitative prerequisite ability and non-cognitive measures. However, theories involving knowledge decay and demographic …

Topic Generation And Development In The Freshman Research Paper, Edward J. Eckel

Assessment Grants

This study will help better understand the cognitive process students go through in developing their research paper topics by examining how students in selected sections of a freshman engineering writing class come up with an initial topic for their course research paper, how they refine or develop that topic into something they can find adequate research on, and how they shape that topic into a purpose statement for their final research paper. Research methodologies include short online surveys, in-person interviews at the end of the semester, and use of a rubric to assess the final submitted purpose statements for their …

Examining Changes In Students' Intercultural Development In Student Affairs Professional Preparation, D. Eric Archer

Assessment Grants

This project is to assess if the multicultural mission of the WMU Higher Education and Student Affairs masters’ program (i.e., “recognize the centrality of diversity and inclusiveness to higher education and to effectively and ethically lead and serve in a dynamic educational culture”) is being fulfilled. Students in the HESA program will complete the Intercultural Development Inventory assessment during their first semester in the program (Fall 2016) and again in their final semester (Spring 2018). This pre-and post-test assessment will provide information regarding students’ intercultural development as a result of completing the program, which places an emphasis within the curriculum …

The Goal-Driven, Resilient, And Influential Teens Program In Kentucky High Schools: The Impact On Social And Emotional Learning And Influencing Factors, Brant Von Goble

Dissertations

In order to assess the effects of the Goal-driven, Resilient, and Influential Teens (GRIT) program on social and emotional learning and academic performance in high schools throughout Kentucky, data from several sources were compiled and analyzed. These sources included results from the Student Engagement and Performance (STEP) survey, an instrument developed by the Rock Solid Evaluation Team at Western Kentucky University and administered yearly to high school students and teachers, and school-level academic and socioeconomic data from the Kentucky Department of Education. Additional data on fidelity of GRIT program implementation were obtained from FranklinCovey, the GRIT program’s developer and publisher. …

The University Of New Hampshire Open Educational Resources Survey, Tracy Keirns, Sean P. Mckinley

Open Educational Resources

The University of New Hampshire Survey Center conducted a survey of UNH faculty members about their usage, understanding, and needs from the University's Open Educational Resources (OER) program. An email invitation to complete the internet survey was sent to one thousand eight hundred and eighty-eight (1,888) UNH faculty members in March 2017. Overall, 437 faculty members responded to the survey, yielding a response rate of 23%. This report includes figures summarizing the survey results; detailed tabular results may be found in Appendix A, Appendix B contains the open-ended responses, and Appendix C contains the survey instrument.

An Investigation Of Accounting Education To Help Students Improve Important Job Skills, Alec Schuberth

Honors Projects in Accounting

Upon graduation, many college students embark on their professional careers in accounting. These graduates have completed their degree and moved to their new, exciting, and challenging jobs; but have these corporations recently expressed satisfaction with the performance of these young employees? Some studies suggest that many executives do not think that their new employees have developed the skills needed to be successful in today’s competitive business landscape. This project extends the literature by examining professional development in college graduates and applying it within the context of accounting education in college and universities nationwide. Overall, this project aims to investigate why …

A Case Study: An Andragogical Exploration Of A Collegiate Swimming And Diving Coach’S Principles And Practices At Lindenwood University, Hannibal Najjar

Dissertations

Andragogy, defined as, “the art and science of helping adults learn” (Knowles, 1980, p. 43) has been used in education and organizations for more than five decades. This philosophy was examined in this study to explore to what extent Andragogy was being used, and perceived to be used, by the coach in a collegiate athletic program. Interviews, observations, and surveys of the coach, along with questionnaires, surveys, and focus group sessions of the student-athletes were used to determine whether an andragogically based coaching approach positively affected the performances and outcomes of the participants. By utilizing an adaptation of Henschke’s (1989) …

The Impact Of A Value-Added Model On Educational Leadership Practices In Northwest Louisiana, Candice D. Webert

Doctoral Dissertations

This study addressed the impact of VAM, concerns with VAM data, uses and interventions educational leaders provided teachers, and components perceived as necessary for VAM effectiveness as an evaluation tool. The demographics used for this study were position, school size, and experience. Due to the documented need for educational accountability from the 1960s to present, the knowledge gained in this study was valuable. While the initiative was implemented as a response to increased accountability, the perceptions and understanding of such new initiatives can impact their effectiveness; in turn, impacting educational leadership. This study focused on the effectiveness of VAM.

In …

The Rise Framework: Using Learning Analytics To Automatically Identify Open Educational Resources For Continuous Improvement, Robert Bodily, Rob Nyland, David Wiley

Entrepreneurship Faculty Research

The RISE (Resource Inspection, Selection, and Enhancement) Framework is a framework supporting the continuous improvement of open educational resources (OER). The framework is an automated process that identifies learning resources that should be evaluated and either eliminated or improved. This is particularly useful in OER contexts where the copyright permissions of resources allow for remixing, editing, and improving content. The RISE Framework presents a scatterplot with resource usage on the x-axis and grade on the assessments associated with that resource on the y-axis. This scatterplot is broken down into four different quadrants (the mean of each variable being the origin) …

Critical Analysis Of The Educational Success Of African Immigrants And African Americans In The U.S., Regina J. Giraldo-Garcia, Joshua G. Bagaka's

Journal of Global Initiatives: Policy, Pedagogy, Perspective

Using the cultural-ecological and culturally relevant theory as the theoretical overarching framework, this study works to quantify the high school achievement gap in mathematics and reading IRT scores between immigrants and U.S.-born black minorities as well as between these students and whites. Based on a nationally representative sample of 1,669 black and 8,682 white students from the NCES Education Longitudinal Study of 2002, a hierarchical linear regression model confirmed that the achievement in mathematics and reading was statistically significant and higher for voluntary compared to involuntary black minorities, but with a small effect size of about one-tenth of a standard …

Western Michigan University 2017 Assessment Conference, Office Of Assessment And Undergraduate Studies

Assessment in Action Conference

Included here is the schedule and session descriptions from the 8th Annual WMU Assessment Conference held on March 17, 2017. The conference, sponsored by the Office of Assessment and Undergraduate Studies at Western Michigan University, is a one-day event where those new to outcomes assessment can come and learn fundamental knowledge about the field, but it is also a place where those who have worked as leaders in outcomes assessment can come and extend their knowledge and skills and network with colleagues. Conference offerings included learning opportunities on various assessment topics for both academic and student supports units.

Reconnecting With “Why” To Move Beyond Assessment Sticking Points, Kristen Mckinney

Assessment in Action Conference

We have made great steps forward in developing assessment infrastructure on our campuses, but often find ourselves still struggling with really making use of the data we collect. Assessment can feel like a chore rather than something that truly has meaning for our work. In this session, Dr. McKinney will discuss how re‐connecting assessment with our core goals and purposes can help refocus our energy and attention in ways that help us use data more effectively to tell our story.

Using Data To Tell Your Story, Kristen Mckinney

Assessment in Action Conference

We are increasingly faced with a dizzying array of options for how to display data. How do we make informed choices about what will really aid the user in telling a compelling story versus those that are just “pretty”? This session will review aspects of visual perception that influence how we process visual information, as well as discuss the messages conveyed by various visual displays and how to select options that best aid the reader in understanding key data points.

Defining Outcomes, Gloria Rogers

Assessment in Action Conference

This workshop will engage participants in the writing of measurable outcomes and how they relate to scoring rubrics. Group discussion and formal feedback will enhance the understanding of the critical role of well‐defined outcomes in the assessment process.

Transforming Data Into Information, Gloria Rogers

Assessment in Action Conference

Data are collected but how do we transform the data to meaningful information that can be used to improve student learning. A case study will be used to explore the criteria for an assessment plan that will lead to actionable information.

Ignatian Pedagogy Certificate Final Project, Natasha M. Teetsov

Ignatian Pedagogy Educational Resources

No abstract provided.

Are The Leadership Behaviors Of K–12 Leaders In Mid-Western Urban School Districts Influenced By Their Beliefs And Attitudes Regarding Spirituality?, Ericka M. Taylor

Dissertations

Working in a stressful and chaotic environment can be difficult for building principals in urban school districts (DeNisco, 2013; Stokley, 2002; Thompson, 2004). Presumably, the job is only expected to get more arduous with the increasing demands to improve student achievement (Allison, 2012; Kimball & Sirotnik, 2000; Queen & Schumacher, 2006). What is quite apparent today is that the role and responsibilities of the principal have changed dramatically over the past twenty years (Carlson, 2012; Hill-Yeverton, 2003) shifting from a factory model of management of learning to one in which teachers and principals have to create more student-centered and project-based …

Expanding A Path Analytic Model Of Quality Management To Include The Management Of Safety, Bruce J. Ladewski

Dissertations

The Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) reports that every year 4.1 million American workers are seriously injured from workplace accidents at an annual direct and indirect cost estimated at hundreds of billions (OSHA, 2012). At the public level, actions to reduce the workplace deaths, injuries, and associated costs in the form legislation. At the private level, actions taken include implementing behavior based safety programs focused on various ways of encouraging employee behaviors to reduce reported injuries. The most recent move to drive down worker injuries focuses on the implementation of management systems by adopting principles used to prevent product …

Case Study: Exploring The Presence Of Trust In One Suburban Christian School Climate, James Drury

Dissertations

Trust is a topic that has been written about hundreds of times, still it is hard to define. In the literature, trust and relationships are grouped together as going hand-in-hand. In Christian education circles, trust is something that is implied to be present. This research explored the presence of trust in a suburban Christian school in the Midwest. The research explored trust from the perception of three different stakeholder groups (staff, parents, and board) from the study school. The researcher used data sets that included: The Visible Elements of Trust Inventory (VETI)- online survey, focus groups by stakeholder type, and …

Missouri Legislator And Administrator Perceptions Of Federal Government Involvement In Education, Roger Allen Woods Jr.

Dissertations

here are very few studies on the views of school administrators and state legislators regarding federal government mandates for schools. Bolman and Deal (2015) believed people align themselves to survive and thrive in the political framework where resources are scarce, and the aspects of power and conflict inform decisions (Douglas & Mehra, 2015; Pourrajab & Ghani, 2016). This study focused on the thought processes of both school administrators who implement federal mandates and state legislators who navigate funding for federal mandates. Leaders of the political parties of Missouri and school administrators were interviewed to gain insight into the motivation and …

From Descendants Of Refugees To First-Generation College Students: The Untold Story Of Southeast Asian American College Students’ Lived Experience, Vunsin Hiew Doubblestein

Dissertations

Aggregate data on Asian Pacific Americans (APAs) may show APAs to have exceptionally high educational attainment and economic mobility compared to other racial groups (Museus & Buenavista, 2016). In reality, various APA sub-groups face significant obstacles to academic access and success and are found at both the highest and lowest levels of the achievement, as well as educational attainment and income spectrums. In spite of the growing awareness of and scholarship on the complexity of APA student experience in higher education, there is limited research on Southeast Asian Americans (SEAAs) who have come to the U.S. as refugees, the circumstances …

The Introduction Of Informal Cooperative Learning Into Our Programming Laboratories, Guity Ravai, Ronald Erdei, Ludmila Nunes, Sahithya Kodam

IMPACT Presentations

Presentation given at the Midwest SoTL Conference. Discusses the effects of implementing informal cooperative learning techniques in an introductory programming course.

Multiple Mini-Interview Performance And First Semester Achievement In A Baccalaureate Respiratory Care Program, Megan S. Koster

All Theses And Dissertations

Success in an undergraduate respiratory care program requires that students demonstrate skills that, although not traditionally assessed in the admissions process, are indicative of success in the clinical environment. Attributes like critical and interpersonal skills, empathy, and self-appraisal are competencies developed by different yet integrated intellectual processes and contribute significantly to the overall perception of intelligence. However, despite limited efficacy in predicting rate of attrition in an undergraduate clinical program such respiratory care, traditional admissions criteria continue to focus solely on objective indicators of academic ability. The purpose of this quantitative case study was to investigate the utility of the …

Learning Competence: The Ability To Develop Competences Independently As Success Factors For Employees, Sabrina Romina Sorko, Ph.D., Christian Trattner

International Journal for Business Education

Continuous improvement are important for every company and hence also for employees. Depending on the field, being state of the art is an important issue (f.e. due to security reasons and regulations). In such cases, it is necessary that employees are proactive in training their competences and therefore ideally act independently. Not only regarding those sectors, continuous improvement is important, but also regarding personal development and career opportunities, the ability to learn and qualify one’s self independently is a key factor.

This paper deals with the question of how learning competence could be defined and what advantages it entail for …

2017 Spring Nutshell, Morehead State University. Institutional Research & Analysis.

Office of Institutional Research & Analysis Publication Archive

Spring 2017 issue of the Nutshell.

A Case Study Of Grade 12 International School Students’ Perceptions Of The Impact Of A Bible Curriculum And The Teachers’ Delivery Of That Bible Curriculum In A Christian International School, Rachael Peterson

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this qualitative case study was to investigate the perceptions of the impact of a Bible curriculum and the teachers’ instructional delivery of that Bible curriculum on grade 12 international school students at an open enrollment Christian international school in Asia. The theories that guided this study were Kohlberg’s moral development, Fowler’s faith development, and Piaget’s cognitive development theories (Fowler, 1991, 2001; Kohlberg & Hersh, 1977; Piaget, 1972). The study’s central question is: How does the perception of both the content of a Bible curriculum and the teachers’ instructional delivery of that Bible curriculum affect students at an …

An Analysis Of Perceptions Of Dropout Factors And Interventions By Middle School And High School Teachers In A Southeastern School District, Christopher Kennedy

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

Although graduation rates are increasing in the United States, high school dropouts remain an issue of significant concern. Much of the focus of research in this area has been on describing the characteristics of dropouts rather than on developing effective interventions. Moreover, emerging research shows that potential dropouts can be identified with confidence as early as the sixth grade. High school is the time in which dropouts are typically identified and interventions begun, but the seeds of dropping out are often planted well before ninth grade. This survey research study with quantitative analysis used an instrument titled Teacher Perceptions of …