Assessment Goes to Grad
We have been enjoying getting to know our UMaine graduate programs better this fall! UMaine has had an organized system for undergraduate program assessment for a number of years, and we are working toward a similar system for our graduate-level programs. We will be piloting graduate program assessment plan writing with two UMaineGOLD graduate programs: Special Education and Instructional Technology.
Establishing learning outcomes is a foundational piece of any good program assessment plan, and given the independent nature of many graduate experiences, establishing program learning outcomes can look different at the graduate level. For this reason, we are focusing our attention on helping graduate programs produce “meaningful, measurable, and manageable” program learning outcomes during this academic year.
To date, we have held two learning outcomes workshops. In October we held a workshop entitled “Graduate Program Outcomes at the Masters and Doctoral Level” in which we walked programs through the importance of establishing sturdy learning outcomes before trying to assess a program. In that workshop we provided some simple strategies for leading a faculty group through the development of learning outcomes. We are planning to offer this workshop again in the spring for graduate programs who are currently working on developing or refining their student learning outcomes. The date for that is still to be determined.
An important question has been raised in this process: “Should the graduate school develop overarching learning goals that inform the learning outcomes of individual programs?” This month we facilitated a mini-workshop with the Graduate School Executive Board to explore what these learning goals would look like. It was a great discussion and ended with a productive time of brainstorming. Stay tuned for more on this in upcoming newsletters!
As always, we are here to help! If you are currently working on writing graduate student learning outcomes for your program, please let us know how we can assist you. Contact Ryan Weatherbee at ryan.a.weatherbee@maine.edu and Mandy Barrington at amanda.barrinton@maine.edu. We are looking forward to working with you in 2020!