Assessment in academic departments and programs guides systematic, regular reflection on teaching and learning, and is a helpful means to confirm or improve curricular and advising strategies.
Academic departments develop learning outcomes for their majors and create Assessment Plans that guide regular inquiry into student learning; the Associate Director of Assessment creates an infrastructure and serves as a resource.
Our assessment process intentionally connects yearly assessment efforts to the College’s 10-year cycle for external reviews. Please see our Google Site for general information about external reviews and assessment, and for private, department-specific folders with timelines and relevant documents.
To support academic department assessment, the Assessment Office:
- Collaborates with academic departments to develop and conduct alumni surveys in preparation for self-studies;
- Provides individual guidance on assessment strategies and methods;
- Creates assessment-related faculty development opportunities at Mac, and in partnership with other institutions, e.g. our current participation in a multi-institutional FaCE grant entitled “Making Assessment Work at Liberal Arts Colleges in the 21st Century” and a Summer 2020 workshop on Creating a Maximally Responsive Syllabus.
- Partners with the Serie Center to offer occasional Faculty Learning Communities, e.g. the 2018 FLC on curricular mapping.