At accrediting conference, panelists acknowledge that effort to measure learning outcomes has been a “hot mess” and that it’s time for a better approach.
GARDEN GROVE, Calif. — Ask the many assessment haters in higher education who is most to blame for what they perceive as the fixation on trying to measure student learning outcomes, and they are likely to put accreditors at the top of the list.
Which is why it was so unexpected last week to hear a group of experts on student learning tell attendees at a regional accreditor’s conference here that most assessment activity to date has been a “hot mess” and that efforts to “measure” how much students learn should be used help individual students and improve the quality of instruction, not to judge the performance of colleges and universities.
The session took place at the Academic Resource Conference, the annual gathering of the WASC Senior College and University Commission, which accredits institutions in California, Hawaii and the Pacific Islands. The panel’s title built off the conference’s theme of “provocative questions and courageous answers,” and asked, in regard to teaching, learning and assessment, “is higher education accomplishing what it said it would?”