General Education Annual Course Assessment Form
(due September 1)
Course Number/Title ___ Western Religions - RELS/HUM/MDES 70A ___ GE Area _C2_
Results reported for AY __2010-11______ # of sections ___2___ # of instructors___1___
Course Coordinator: __Jennifer RYCENGA____ email: ___jrycenga@earthlink.net_
Department Chair: __Chris Jochim________ College: ___Humanities and Arts____
Instructions: Each year, the department will prepare a brief (two page maximum) report that
documents the assessment of the course during the year. This report will be electronically
submitted by the department chair to the Office of Undergraduate Studies with an electronic
copy to the home college by September 1 of the following academic year.
Part 1
To be completed by the course coordinator:
(1) What SLO(s) were assessed for the course during the AY?
SLO 2: Respond to significant human accomplishments that illuminate enduring
concerns, by writing both research-based critical analyses and personal
responses.
(2) What were the results of the assessment of this course? What were the lessons learned
from the assessment?
The professor who taught this course, and is writing this report, designed an assignment in the
Spring of 2011, that enabled students to articulate both the ideals of two of the three major
Western religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), and to show how leading figures from these
faiths exemplified or betrayed those ideals. Thus, students used their research skills to delineate
both the abstract principles of the religions, and their lived complexity through exemplary
figures. In their quizzes, administered at least every week, students reacted to the scriptures of
the religions, and cultural achievements motivated by religious belief. The course coordinator
feels that this SLO constitutes a necessary evaluative function in an introductory western
religions course, wherein students deconstruct the monolithic notion of an unchanging eternal
religion, and understand instead that, like genres of music or forms of government, religions are
morphing entities made real by the people who live them, and try to live up to them.
On another note, the issues addressed in last year’s assessment, about including more exemplary
figures, especially in philosophic and theological areas, rather than focusing too tightly on
scripture, yielded some improvement for both SLO 1 and SLO 2.
(3) What modifications to the course, or its assessment activities or schedule, are planned
for the upcoming year? (If no modifications are planned, the course coordinator
should indicate this.)
There are no modifications planned for this year in terms of how the SLOs are taught,
assessed, or evaluated.
Part 2
To be completed by the department chair (with input from course coordinator as appropriate):
(4) Are all sections of the course still aligned with the area Goals, Student Learning
Objectives (SLOs), Content, Support, and Assessment? If they are not, what actions
are planned?
YES.