Bryan: This website is not monitored closely. It was created as a place to store the committee’s annual report and is linked to from the committee’s description on <http://committees.vassar.edu/>.
The following is from a senior faculty member who had some knowledge of what the committee is supposed to do. Perhaps this should be added to this website:
“The original idea of the committee was that each year a new committee would choose one area of the curriculum to look at and make recommendations to the relevant entities in the college about steps that could be taken to improve the assessment of that part of the curriculum. So for example: freshman seminars. The committee’s job would be to look at how the seminars are structured and how they function and suggest to the freshman seminar steering committees ways in which they might think of strengthening the assessment element in the seminar. The assessment committee therefore is feeding ideas to the relevant standing committees about the particular concern of assessment. Over the years it proved difficult to complete work on the chosen topic in one year, so it became normal for the committee to carry on the topic for a second year, even though in theory the committee changes membership completely every year–with the idea of giving as many faculty as possible “exposure” to the assessment question. With the Middle States five-year review coming up, I would imagine that Jon Chenette might have some sense of what would be helpful for the committee to take on. I know he wants to return to the ‘tagging’ project, which the assessment committee worked on when I was on it. … Basically the committee is supposed to keep the process of assessment in all parts of the curriculum in the forefront of people’s thinking, without legislating particular steps that should be taken. Rather, it works with the relevant other committees to improve and strengthen the way we assess our students’ learning.”
Governance
By-laws of the Faculty
Article 2
Section 20. Committee on Assessment
A. The committee shall consist of three faculty members elected by the faculty, one from each division of the curriculum, for a term of one year. The dean of the faculty and the institutional research officer shall be ex officio members of the committee. The chair of the committee shall be elected from among the three faculty representatives.
B. The committee shall examine and evaluate the practices in place to achieve the college’s educational goals as stated in its mission statement and elsewhere. Each year it shall investigate topics that bear on the achievement of the college’s stated goals and also address over a ten-year period all of the “Standards for Accreditation” published by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. The results of this investigation shall be presented to the faculty at the end of each academic year and shall contribute to the material presented to the Middle States accreditation committee every ten years. The committee shall also make suggestions to the appropriate bodies about ways to bring the college’s practices and its goals into closer alignment.
C. The topics for investigation in the following year shall be chosen by the committee before the election of the following year’s committee
Does anyone monitor this webpage anymore? If so, what is the function of the Assessment Committee?
Bryan: This website is not monitored closely. It was created as a place to store the committee’s annual report and is linked to from the committee’s description on <http://committees.vassar.edu/>.
The following is from a senior faculty member who had some knowledge of what the committee is supposed to do. Perhaps this should be added to this website:
“The original idea of the committee was that each year a new committee would choose one area of the curriculum to look at and make recommendations to the relevant entities in the college about steps that could be taken to improve the assessment of that part of the curriculum. So for example: freshman seminars. The committee’s job would be to look at how the seminars are structured and how they function and suggest to the freshman seminar steering committees ways in which they might think of strengthening the assessment element in the seminar. The assessment committee therefore is feeding ideas to the relevant standing committees about the particular concern of assessment. Over the years it proved difficult to complete work on the chosen topic in one year, so it became normal for the committee to carry on the topic for a second year, even though in theory the committee changes membership completely every year–with the idea of giving as many faculty as possible “exposure” to the assessment question. With the Middle States five-year review coming up, I would imagine that Jon Chenette might have some sense of what would be helpful for the committee to take on. I know he wants to return to the ‘tagging’ project, which the assessment committee worked on when I was on it. … Basically the committee is supposed to keep the process of assessment in all parts of the curriculum in the forefront of people’s thinking, without legislating particular steps that should be taken. Rather, it works with the relevant other committees to improve and strengthen the way we assess our students’ learning.”
Governance
By-laws of the Faculty
Article 2
Section 20. Committee on Assessment
A. The committee shall consist of three faculty members elected by the faculty, one from each division of the curriculum, for a term of one year. The dean of the faculty and the institutional research officer shall be ex officio members of the committee. The chair of the committee shall be elected from among the three faculty representatives.
B. The committee shall examine and evaluate the practices in place to achieve the college’s educational goals as stated in its mission statement and elsewhere. Each year it shall investigate topics that bear on the achievement of the college’s stated goals and also address over a ten-year period all of the “Standards for Accreditation” published by the Middle States Commission on Higher Education. The results of this investigation shall be presented to the faculty at the end of each academic year and shall contribute to the material presented to the Middle States accreditation committee every ten years. The committee shall also make suggestions to the appropriate bodies about ways to bring the college’s practices and its goals into closer alignment.
C. The topics for investigation in the following year shall be chosen by the committee before the election of the following year’s committee