Assessment Steering Committee Meeting
MINUTES
TYPE OF MEETING
FACILITATOR
NOTE TAKER
ATTENDEES
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 26, 2014
11:00–11:50
AMC Mississippi Room
Assessment Steering Committee
Lisa Foss, Convener
Holly Evers
HBS: Kerry Marrer
SOE: Kathy Dahlberg, Frances Kayona
COLA: Wendy Bjorklund
CETL: Lalita Subrahmanyan
SCEE: Vacant
SPA: David Switzer
Special Services: Robin Ewing
Liberal Ed: Vacant
Assessment GA: Sam Gaikwad
Cont. Studies: Michael Penrod
Academic Affairs: Lisa Foss
COSE: Sandra Johnson
Graduate Studies: Melanie Guentzel
SHHS: Jill Snippen
Student L&D: Vacant
UC: Adam Klepetar
Student: Dixie Johnson
Guest:
MINUTES
Motion to approve – Adam Klepetar moved to approve the minutes
Second- Wendy Bjorklund
Motion passed unanimously.
COMMITTEE BUSINESS

ANNOUNCEMENTS
DISCUSS
TK20 Training Server—Lisa had a conversation with our Tk20 salesperson and
discovered the possibility of a permanent training server for campus use. It
could act as a playground/staging area, as well as, serve for training.
 TK20 On Sight Training—Lisa also discovered that we have paid for several
days of on sight training from Tk20. Holly discussed the process with our Tk20
product consultants. Discussion of topics and planning the training will be
discussed at a later ASC meeting.
 HLC QI Presentation during April 4—members were encouraged to attend.
 HLC QI Communication- to Assessment leaders on campus. Members were
asked to send Holly a list of their unit assessment committees, which has been
requested by the HLC QI Communications committee.
Assessment Peer Consultants (APCs)
 CETL Faculty Learning Community Application. The committee opted to
have a sub-committee of volunteers work on the conception and actualization
of the FLC rather than using committee time. The previously established
volunteers: Joyce, Lalita, Sandy, and Wendy will form the sub committee.
Holly will set up their meetings.
 Brainstorming. Committee members were asked to brainstorm ideas for
using, engaging and growing the APC program.
o Creation of a D2L assessment course—interactive with resources
and space for questions and discourse. The discussion began to
sound very much like the assessment handbook that already exists
online. There was no particular interest in its creation nor the running
of an ongoing assessment course with rotating readings and materials
modeled after the WASC assessment leadership school. Wendy
suggested that APCs could be asked to monitor the course or possibly
run it.
o Guideblog-- Lalita and Robin mentioned the “guideblog” project.
People will create paragraphs on a given topic along with several
questions for discussion. They mentioned it in conjunction with the
Assessment Update reviews done by Holly. Holly stressed that she
did not want it to turn into the Assessment Newsletter, which everyone
loved in principal but not in practice; No one wanted to create content
for the newsletter. If, however, we could use materials that already
exist, then that would be easy to parlay into guideblog materials.
Robin mentioned we could do regular assessment installments that
could be searchable. It might be possible to link to the aforementioned
D2L course.
o APC hybrid training—F2F + D2L. It could be a semester long course
with periodic face-to-face (F2F) training. Holly suggested it might be
easier for faculty to follow an online course, which would require less
scheduling. Wendy stressed the amount of time it took to create the
original APC training. Lalita suggested that Friday during January
workshops is free; we could do initial F2F training at that time. It
would give training creators the fall semester to create the training.
o Probationary Faculty—Lalita mentioned the CETL sessions for new
faculty. Wendy mentioned Jim Sherohman’s belief that we need to get
to new faculty quickly, before they become convinced that
assessment is extra work. We need to convince them that assessment
is easily incorporated into their course planning. Lalita stressed that
many of these individuals are focused on very basic elements of their
course planning, ie. How to create a syllabus. She thinks any time
spent on assessment needs to be immediately applicable. She
mentioned several sessions that had fallen flat, including one on
dealing with difficult students.
o Use of students—Holly mentioned the Assessment Update article
that talked about using students to help with the assessment process.
Lalita mentioned that MSU Mankato has students that perform
teaching evaluations. She also mentioned having students send out
surveys. Melanie mentioned using students to do focus groups. There
was a fair amount of enthusiasm about the idea—committee members
believed that many grad students would be interested in the training
as potential professional development.
Liberal Education Assessment
Holly Evers invited Joe Melcher to the April 9 meeting to tell committee members
about the history and process of LE assessment.
Next Meeting: Liberal Education Assessment