Ongoing assessment is a valuable process for determining whether general education is meeting its program goals. From the results of assessment, important information is gained about how students benefit from general education and how program effectiveness can continue to be improved.
The General Education Committee is responsible for the assessment of OU’s General Education program. Department chairs are responsible for providing information regarding general education courses in their departments.
OU will continue its triennial review cycle for general education. OU’s General Education program emphasizes ten knowledge areas plus U.S diversity and a capstone. Throughout the undergraduate course of study, a student will be taught skills and mentored in experiences to develop these competencies. Faculty in each academic unit will define these competencies in terms of measurable objectives that can be assessed at the completion of the undergraduate experience. Any general education program must be developed in partnership with a plan to measure its effectiveness.
Each year, four courses in four of these areas will undergo review. In addition to the current review of syllabi, the new triennial review will include assessment of student performance on the general education learning outcomes and indirect assessment of the cross-cutting capacities (graduating senior survey). For more information about the assessment process and program review, see the Assessment abstract from the Proposal for the Renewal of General Education at Oakland University
To ensure continuous quality of the general education curriculum a complete program review will be conducted in 2009 (four years after inception) and every seven years thereafter (after two triennial cycles). The program review will look at course assessments and identify other areas of the program that could be improved, such as facilities, staffing, ratio of full to part-time faculty, class size, relationship to other programs, etc.