University Assessment Council Meeting Minutes
October 28, 2004
10:30 AM – 12:00 PM
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RT 1701
Present: Jeffrey Chen, Sandra Emerick, John Holcomb, Constance Hollinger, Benoy Joseph ,
George Lupone, B. Modney, Rosemary Sutton , Vida Svarcas, John Tomko, Peter Trumpower,
Jane Zaharias, and Debra Sudy (Clerk)
Guest: Michael Mina, University Data Administrator
1. Welcome and Minutes Today’s meeting was chaired by R. Sutton. R. Sutton welcomed new
Council member C. Hollinger, Professor, Psychology Department, and announced that two
additional members are expected to join. The September 23, 2004 minutes were reviewed and
changes noted.
2. Update on Assessment Reports and Reviews R. Sutton announced that only five programs
are currently out and another 4 or 5 are in progress. She hopes to get these in by the end of the
semester. Many departments were surprised to find that reviewers read last year’s reports as
part of the review process. She thanked J. Chen and P. Trumpower for their voluntary
participation in all the review days as well as all who participated in the review process.
3. Academic Profile R. Sutton stated that G. Kaul feels it is important to administer this survey
for the NCA report next year for inclusion in the General Education Assessment piece. J. Chen
provided a handout with information/scenarios and measures to consider: total number of
credit hours (90 hrs vs 30 hrs); test forms: standard (108 questions/120 min.) or abbreviated
form (36 questions/45 min.); and administration (classroom or mailing). J. Chen stated that G.
Kaul would like feedback on how many/which students to survey and what formula to use. C.
Hollinger responded that in considering the realities of our students, some seniors are still
taking their Gen. Ed courses and recommended considering the larger number of total Gen. Ed
hours in the criteria.
J. Chen stated that there are two broad options: how big a sample and whether to specify by
college. V. Svarcas asked if we would need to differentiate by college if we are testing only
Gen Ed. B. Joseph agreed and suggested combining all colleges for a larger sample. B.
Modney added that she would like to see, if feasible, a comparison breakdown by college. P.
Trumpower asked J. Chen for the timeframe for feedback. J. Chen responded that we would
receive results within three weeks of sending the survey in – plenty of time for Spring
administration. R. Sutton asked whether we would go into the classroom or bring students in.
B. Joseph responded that a class is a captured audience and with faculty support or an incentive
that should bring a good response rate. He suggested a semester of free parking or bookstore
certificate as incentives for students to do well. S. Emerick agreed with keeping it in the
academic environment to make student’s take it more seriously.
J. Chen suggested surveying students with 55 credits or more. S. Emerick suggested querying
to see which classes have the most students that meet the criteria. R. Sutton suggested
contacting those faculty. C. Hollinger noted that most of the introductory psych classes tag a
research requirement that could include the survey. R. Sutton agreed that a psych course
requirement is a good way to approach it. B. Modney agreed and that it would also be easy to
incorporate into BIOS but wondered if we would bias the sample. R. Sutton concluded with the
possibility of speaking to the Associate deans about what classes to include and that this topic
would be discussed more at the next meeting.
Page 2
4. Alumni Survey M. Mina provided a handout of the ACT Alumni Survey. There are 32
questions and 30 additional optional questions to develop. The survey is not available online
but could be bundled by department so that questions are department-specific. Plans are to
survey the alumni who completed degrees in 1998 and 2003. This would be a total of 6,286
persons. Three hundred CSU t-shirts have been offered as incentives. M. Mina is hoping that
Associate Deans will contact chairs to solicit questions.
J. Zaharias asked if this would be on-going or a one-time survey expressing concerns about the
instrument. Education has developed their own instruments and the 30 question allotment may
be insufficient for their needs. Also the possibility that someone will complete this is limited
considering its length. Several sections seem unnecessary – there are safety questions mixed in
with Gen Ed. We know the answer to some of these as well. We know why students pick CSU:
schedule flexibility, location, etc. M. Mina agreed that, as an alumnus, he should not be asked
for his GPA, gender, birthdate – CSU should have that data. B. Joseph asked what the average
response rate has been for this survey. He noted terrible response rates on past surveys and
suggested using a shorter survey. M. Mina will check the survey’s response rate.
P. Trumpower stated that KSU recently did a telephone survey. They kept it short, simple and
followed-up with contact. S. Emerick suggested creating our own survey. R. Sutton responded
that creating one creates other problems as well: benchmarking, reliability, validity, etc.
R. Sutton stated that G. Kaul feels we need to do the survey for NCA and Board of Regents as
well. We don’t have a lot of instrument choices. C. Hollinger responded to J. Zaharias
comment and asked if it would be possible for Education to not survey their alumni the year
that we administer ACT. J. Zaharias responded that might be an option but noted that
instruments were not used for internal purposes only but for accreditation and professional
agencies as well. R. Sutton suggested doing ACT the years that Education doesn’t do theirs.
She also noted that we would need additional questions from colleges fairly quickly. C.
Hollinger suggested leaving it up to the college whether or not they’d like to submit additional
questions; maybe only 5 or 10 additional as thirty seems overkill. R. Sutton asked M. Mina if
there were shorter instruments. M. Mina stated that G. Kaul had checked and there were none
shorter. B. Joseph suggested a survey research firm could design a survey but benchmarking
may not always include the peers you would want. R. Sutton stated that we would go back and
look for a shorter version. J. Zaharias commented that people are sensitive about giving
information such as social security numbers, loan amounts, current salary, etc. B. Modney
suggested enclosing a cover letter that asked respondents to not answer specific sections.
5. Web site Progress R. Sutton distributed an outline of the content and stated that she could not
find any good models. The website will have multiple purposes (information and NCA
resource.) She asked for Council members to email her with suggestions and comments.
6. Possible Spring Events R. Sutton announced two alternatives for a possible spring event: (1)
Classroom Assessment Techniques co-sponsored with UCTL. J. Holcomb attended a
conference with this topic and would be a resource. (2) Bring in a consultant to hold sessions
within colleges. Reports would be sent prior to the visit to give the consultant background
information on each colleges progress and concerns.
7. Other Business: B. Joseph asked whether R. Sutton would like a response to the reviews or
to be updated on assessment progress. R. Sutton responded that it wasn’t necessary to submit
anything at this time but that it would be covered in the next review cycle.
Next meeting: December 2, 2004, 10:30 am – 12:00 pm, RT 1701
AC minutes 10.28.04f
12/2/2004 2:34 PM