Friday, November 20, 2015

Friday, November 20, 2015

Student Learning Outcomes Assessment Steering Committee

Minutes
November 20, 2015
Café Conference Room 8:10 a.m. to 9:00 a.m.

Present: Michelle Beasley, Paul Blake, Geoffrey Dyer, Abbas Jarrahian, Michael Jiles, Tina Mendoza, Debora Rodenhauser and Brandy Young
Guest: Sharyn Eveland
Absent: Vicki Jacobi and Mark Williams

Approval of Minutes from October 16, 2015
The minutes from October 16, 2015 were approved without changes.

Institutional Effectiveness Partnership Initiative (IEPI) Visit
Geoffrey begin the overview with some background for IEPI:

Peer Review Teams (PRT) – The IEPI group is made up of a group of collegiate peers that visit schools in order to give feedback on specific areas of need.

In the spring 2014 semester, Taft College submitted an application to the IEPI group requesting a visit to the campus to assist with Program Review and SLOs with a focus on budget allocation.

The College included the upcoming IEPI PRT visit as an Actionable Improvement Plan in the 2015 Self Evaluation.

Upon arrival, the PRT met with Administrators, the Strategic Planning Committee, the Professional Development Committee, SLO/ASC and other staff that are directly involved with program review and SLOs.

The PRT asked questions about what worked and what wasn’t working.

In late December or January, the PRT will submit a report with feedback regarding their observations.

The College can then develop a formal plan of action.

The PRT will have two more follow up visits.

There is a one-time $150,000 fund that may be issued from IEPI to help facilitate and implement the new plan.

If the College is allotted the $150,000 a third follow up visit from the PRT will take place to gauge how well the College is implementing the plan.

SLO Policy – Begin Conversation
Even though the College has been assessing SLOs for many years it is still unclear what the procedure or policy is. Geoffrey asked the SLO/ASC members what they felt was the College’s SLO policy. Their answers were as follows:
Do your assessments annually.
Social Sciences assesses the Big Picture SLO division wide.
The division chair dictated what SLOs to assess.
Department selective is the usual practice.

Geoffrey gave a brief history of SLOs and the assessment process:
In 2009 the Academic Senate and Planning Council (Governance Council) approved a process for SLO assessment which was for faculty to assess one CSLO and one PSLO.
Over time this process was no longer followed. There are a few departments that still utilize this process, but overall the majority do not assess PSLOs.
New faculty stated that there is a need to have a distinction between SLOs and course objectives since SLOs and course objectives are on the Course Outlines of Record.
It was stated that there is a need to revisit and reteach policy.
SLO Day during inservice:
There will be three ours at the beginning of SLO Day for faculty to assess their SLOs.
The rest of the day may be used for discussion of SLO data.
There should be training offered during this time as well.

The eLumen mapping tool and reporting:
There is a question of how SLO data is aggregated once CSLOs, PSLOs and ISLOs are mapped (aligned).
Brandy will contact the eLumen team and ask for a clear description of how the reporting is generated.

Two models were discussed regarding SLO assessment:
All CSLOs, +1 PSLO, +1 GE SLO, +1 ISLO should be assessed each semester (OR)
All CSLOs are assessed but a schedule and a flexible plan is decided upon by the department.

It was decided by the committee that a special meeting will be held on Monday, November 23 to choose a focus area in order to begin the formulation of the SLO Policy. There were four areas recommended as a starting point:
Timeframe for assessments
Number of SLOs per course
Schedule of assessments
Additional assessments – other SLOs, course, program, Institutional and Gen Ed

Next Meeting: Monday, November 23, 2015 – 8:10 to 9:00 a.m. in the Café Conference Room
Respectfully submitted by Brandy Young