Office of Academic Assessment

Communication Sciences and Disorders

Graduate Report

In Fall 2019 the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders compared student learning outcomes from two program modalities and three curricular products including neuro exams, neuro role play, and a clinical methods case study. This project was inspired by the start of the online master’s program, Speech@Emerson, that was implemented alongside the long standing on-campus master’s program.  Both the online and on-campus programs employ similar “lock-step” curricula albeit delivered via different modalities. In our on-campus program, students take coursework in a traditional face-to-face classroom setting with course content delivered during live lecture and in-classroom activities. For Speech@Emerson students, coursework is delivered using a hybrid format; students are required to participate in asynchronous course activities. They are also required to attend a weekly 90-minute weekly synchronous course session (i.e. “live session”) conducted by a Course Facilitator via Zoom. In the first semester of the applied graduate curriculum, all students take a course entitled, CD 680 Neurological Bases of Communication. CD 680 is described as a foundational course that outlines the anatomy and functional neurophysiology of human communication; and it provides an overview of neurodevelopment and its processes and disorders. Although the organization of the human nervous system is presented, emphasis is placed on the relationship of this organization to the components of the various communicative, cognitive, linguistic, sensory, and motor processes that are central to human communication and to the treatment of its disorders. Because of the didactic nature of the content, CD 680 requires students to memorize visual diagrams, terms, and neuroanatomical structures. They take several exams to demonstrate what they have learned. In addition, students complete a role-played presentation requiring them to explain a communication impairment from a neurological perspective. Passing CD 680 (earning a course grade of B- or better) has proved challenging for many students in both the on-campus and the Speech@Emerson program. In an effort to support the learning acquired in lecture, both on-campus and SAE students have access to professor’s office hours to help solidify and clarify concepts. On-campus students also have access to sessions with Peer Neuro Tutors who are master’s students who have taken the course previously and performed well in it. A preliminary analysis suggests that the on-campus master’s students scored higher on Neuro Exams than the Speech@Emerson students. Mean scores were different despite the fact that both student cohorts were taught by the same instructor using similar content and material. Both cohorts had access to faculty in class and during office hours. However, on-campus students also had access to Peer Neuro Tutors; unlike the Speech@Emerson students. Peer Neuro Tutors conduct free individual and small group tutoring sessions, initiated by the students in the class, to support the students’ understanding of the Neuro material and to prepare for exams. Also, we note that many of the Speech@Emerson cohort have been out of school for some years. Unlike the on-campus cohort, these students do not typically move directly from their undergraduate Communication Disorders program to their master’s program. 

Spring 2020

The Spring 2020 assessment process followed up from the previous semester's report on student learning in the Speech@Emerson program. The Fall 2019 analysis that was conducted indicated that the students enrolled in the on-campus master's program scored higher on Neuro Exams than the online Speech@Emerson program did, despite being taught by the same instructor. As a result a peer tutor was put in place for the Spring 2020 semester. Additionally, CSD looked to see how Speech@Emerson students performed on another modality as a comparison of previous assessment processes. This report is a continuation of the comparison of the performance among the  in-person graduate students  versus the  SAE graduate students, as outlined in the 2019 report. The Spring 2020 report did a comparative analysis of the two cohorts, using the Clinical Methods III "Avery" Project as the comparitive work. The "Avery" Project requires students to write a two part narrative summary for a client that has sustained a right hemisphere stroke. The first portion requires students to collect and describe intake information, while the second portion asks student to describe the assement results and create intervention goals. The same rubric was utilized across both cohorts for this project and extensive feedback was given. The results indicated the mean scores for part 1 of the project were similar across both cohorts. However, in part 2, although not statistically significant, the low scoring SAE students aooear to perform lower than the other cohort on the task asking for a complex clinical analysis which involves the intervention planning, even when they were provided with explicit feedback from their instructors. After recieving extensive feedback the high scoring SAE students were able to improve their scores which showed consistency with the on campus cohort. It was suggested that the low scoring SAE students may struggle with clinical writing, which is an important component for part 2 of the assignment and would benefit from additional support with a tutor or mentor to help in understanding feedback, so that they can go on to create high quality responses. 

Communication Studies 

No Report Submitted

Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies 

Fall 2019 Perspective 

The Fall 2019 report reviewed the Global Diversity perspective assessed Intercultural Communication (CC 203). The fundamental goal of the of this course is to "give students an overview of the problems, issues, and processes involved with communicating with people of different cultures and sub-cultural backgrounds." This assessment project collected a combination of students' final papers and presentations. The sampled works were aligned with the fundamental goal stated above as it  followed a clear structure, with step by step instructions designed to help students analyze the communicative tensions that arise in the encounter of different cultures and traditions. Since all the projects followed the same formal guidelines and applied the same conceptual tools, it is believed that the data yields reliable results.The analysis indicates that this representation of student work meets the three SLOs of the Global Diversity Perspective. The levels of competency among students vary, but all the work exhibits an understanding of the SLOs. A lower score was given to a handful of students that did not provide historical context to the intercultural conflict they were analyzing. Including historical context was not part of the assignment, but many included it nonetheless. As a result of this assessment, the instructor will add this as a requirement, since awareness of historical factors ranks very highly in the assessment rubric we developed. A more significant finding is that judging from the limited selection of courses under the purview, it seems likely that not all instructors teaching in the Global Diversity Perspective are aware of the SLOs, a matter which will be further explored as a result of this project.

Spring 2020 Perspective

As part of an ongoing analysis of Perspectives offered in the ILAIS department, the SLC chose to review the Quantitative Reasoning (QR) Perspective in the spring semester of 2020. Two statistics courses were chosen for review for this SLC project. The goal of the project was to measure alignment of the QR SLOs with learning activities and to see how well students met the objectives through the learning activities. This project became a unique process as it offered a perspective of in-person learning models and a fast transition to an online model due to COVID-19. The overall findings showed the need to merge some of the SLOs  together due to redundancy, another finding indicated the how well the students grasped the learning objective, as it correlated to each question, this process was utilized through a sampling of 59 students and 29 questions. An example from this process states that "approximately 65% of the students received full credit, with an additional 15% scoring above 80%. Only 11% of these questions received zero credit, and some of these zeroes may have been a result of absence or an incomplete exam. We believe that Learning Objective One is clearly being absorbed by nearly all students and mastered by most." 

Journalism

After spending the 2016-2017, 2017-2018, and 2018-2019 school year fine tuning their programmatic and tier level SLOs and curriculum, and then developing the first drafts of the tier rubrics, the JR department started the final push to create the tier rubrics for the five remaining tiers in the 2019-2020 school year. Two retreats occurred in February and May to draft, edit, and finalize the tier rubrics. The final drafts were sent to the Office of Academic Assessment and the department faculty for approval. The goal is to begin assessing the rubrics during the Fall 2020 semester. 

Marketing Communication 

Spring 2020: No Report Submitted

Performing Arts

Report forthcoming December 2020

Visual and Media Arts

Fall 2019 

In Fall 2019, three sections of VM-200 were assessed to identify deficiencies occurring and create solutions to address those deficiencies. This process utilized a multidisciplinary approach by including faculty members from several departments to assist in the data analysis, assessment, and creating tools to help assess the collected work. Through this 45 writing samples were collected from the three sections of VM-200.

Writing, Literature, and Publishing

Fall 2019

No Report Submitted

Spring 2020

No Report Submitted 

Communication Sciences and Disorders

Undergraduate Report

During spring 2019, the CSD department analyzed student work from CD 403: Speech Science (which is a required course for CSD majors)  to appraise the extent to which the following objectives were met: 

• Demonstrate a foundational understanding of the scientific bases of communication and its disorders
• Practice critical thinking and rational inquiry in the study of communication disorders.

Student's work was analyzed through use of quantitative scores gathered from four quizzes given in the class. The four quizzes each aligned with one or more of the SLOs described above. The results for quiz 1 showed that students achieved higher scores on the questions aligning with the "demonstrate a foundational understanding of the scientific bases of communication disorders" than they did with the other SLO presented.  The second quiz showed a parallel between quiz one, and it found that the extent of meeting the "practice critical thinking and rational inquiry in the study of communication disorders" SLO in both quizzes one and two were nearly indistinguishable. Quiz three showed promise with the topic of  speech acoustics, a topic that students often find to be challenging. Lastly, quiz four paralleled the results from quiz three in terms of the second outcome, as it honed in on critical thinking. The averages for the critical thinking SLO ranged in the 70s, percentage wise.  The information for this project is valuable for the CSD department, as it will provided insight for the next time this class is offered and what areas need more work to be done in regard to student learning. 

Communication Studies 

No report submitted

Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies

Journalism 

For the 2018-2019 school year the Journalism department worked on creating tier rubrics from the five measurable programmatic SLOs that took effect during the 2017-2018 school year. Through this process they made sure that each tier included the measurable programmatic SLOs. The department detailed their process by compiling a spreadsheet of learning objectives listed for each course, which was then analyzed to standardized the SLOs at the program level. Concurrently, the department began to develop their tier level rubrics for each course offered in all eight tiers of the curriculum which began with consultations, grew into small teams, and then resulted in an all-day workshop to continue drafting the rubrics. The next steps of this project included the editing process from each tier, completed through collaborative work among each faculty in their tier. The first three that were developed and implemented for beta testing included Journalism Essentials, Daily Journalism, and the Capstone tiers. In the months following the conclusion of the 2018-2019 school year more rubrics were developed and beta tested in the following school year, which completed the process of each tier rubric, closing the loop on this project during the 2019-2020 school year. 

Marketing Communication

In the Spring of 2019, Marketing Communications created a background learning assessment for incoming Business of Creative Enterprise Students in BC 110: Introduction to the Creative Economy. In 2019, BCE entered its third year as new major in Marketing Communication and from that emerged patterns of the student population, with the focus initially being on first year students, then welcoming students who have transferred, thus giving a mix of first-year and sophomore students. The mix of students and refined assignments allowed for a clearer focus on the challenges that face incoming students. The over-arching theme of the course is transformation, as we explore how the Creative Economy has created significant shifts in business, culture, and our individual experience as consumers and creatives. The assignments across the units build upon each other, and integrate professional skills.  For instance, the first assignment is open-ended, with a focus on the creative process and involving a presentation.  The second, a report on the management of creativity at traditional and disruptive companies in the creative industries, includes a SWOT analysis.  In the final assignment, students combine their report findings with an analysis of the related industry and apply creative thinking to develop both imaginative and logical ideas for the future of the “focal five” creative industries of the program: film, TV, music, performing arts, marketing, and publishing. Each unit culminates with an assignment that invites students to independently and collaboratively leverage research to delve deeply into the businesses and processes of the Creative Economy, and to share this knowledge with the class via presentations. In the past the unit 2 exercise was an individual assignment, but a team-based model was tested for the following reasons:

• to see students to begin collaborating, as this is a core part of the BCE structure, and it is healthy to begin collaboration in pairs
• It is important for students to see and learn from each other’s work.  Partnering on a research and writing assignment allows them to work together to understand strategies for research, writing styles, citations and grammar.
• the content plays an important role in the overall course learning, for all students, and that placing students in pairs can improve confidence in the presentation of the material as well as inspire students to explore their own perspectives.  (For instance, in one of the Music Industry teams, the two students, who were researching Apple, explored their own use of music streaming platforms, with one being enthusiastic about Spotify and the other a passionate Apple user. It made for an engaging and insightful presentation.)

The committee member thought that the partnering aspect would be challenging for the students. The project presentations were strong, but the papers were another matter.  Half the class did not have citations.  Two international students were flagged by their teammates for plagiarism.  Two papers used bullets—but only produced an outline.  A “partial rubric” was used for grading the assignment, with each section being evaluated on a scale of 0 to 5, and notes bulleted out for each section.  This format was especially helpful for student teams who were resubmitting their papers as they knew where to target their efforts in making corrections.  It also allowed the scorer to support positives, while getting into details of challenge areas. In conclusion it was found that it is beneficial to create an environment where students are working on the assignments with dedication to doing it correctly. It was also found that significant writing competencies are needed at a college level, such as citations and plagiarism,  and can no longer be “assumed” that students know how to do, but instead need to be evaluated for prior the start of an assignment.

Performing Arts 

In the 2018-2019 school year, the Performing Arts department sought to improve diversity in the World Drama The objective for the SLC project was to improve diversity in the World Drama curriculum. The courses TH 215: World Drama I and TH 216: World Drama II taught in 2018 were examined along with the syllabus from the course taught in 2017. This process examined syllabi reviewing the content and placement of SLOs, alignment of language in the syllabi when compared to the course catalogue description, the structure of readings, consistencies of assignments, distribution and consistency of point allocations, emphasis on different cultures in reading and work schedule (e.g. race, religion, ethnicity, nationality, class, sexuality, etc.), consistency of SLOs in each syllabus with focus on cultural diversity, number of plays required, number of supplemental readings, amount and diversity of theatre cultures studied, and the amount and ratio of female playwrights represented. The result of this process led to combining World Drama I and World Drama II to create improved diversity amongst the course and follow-up with a new course that emphasized the diversity. As a result, the syllabi, SLOs, ad curriculum were revised and implemented the following school year.  

Visual and Media Arts

Spring 2019

For the 2018-2019 school year, the Department of Visual and Media Arts combined their assessment to focus on the entirety of the program. In this assessment, a randomly sampled cohort of students was collected for each year, this in total was a summary of a four-year assessment process. The findings showed that students at the freshman level in VM120 possessed a lower level thinking skill set, such as memorization, but found  appropriately reflected the level of learning for introductory courses and demonstrated a fairly good understanding of history and theory of media arts, however, visual arts does not appear to be addressed in the exams that were reviewed. The sophomore level sampling found evidence of a lack of basic skills, which they found can persist well into senior year. A major theme for the cohort of junior level found a significant number of film-based projects that do not include any sort of title, or credits, leaving reviewers unclear about the students’ role in creating the works. This lack of attributing aspects of a project to its creators extends to the incorporation of media that was clearly not created by Emerson students, such as copyrighted music or footage from YouTube videos and Instagram feeds, including that of celebrities. It was also found that students fail to define project objectives or to hone basic production and/or research techniques before attempting to produce finished work. This can lead to an over-reliance on pop-culture tropes and cliché. Lastly, at the senior level, it seemed that fourth year students are still being trained to complete assignments, rather than to develop a body of creative work and/or scholarship. Although production work is often technically accomplished, it is often not clear that it rises above technical exercises. The hope is, that by the senior year, students will transition from completing technical exercises to developing a creative voice and a body of meaningful work. The committee saw evidence that students often seemed to be able to remember key terminology, specific facts, conventions, trends, and theories, as evidenced in quiz and exam results and in some cases, research paper samples. Although the students were able to apply some important visual and media arts concepts, there is less evidence of analysis, evaluation or synthesis.

Writing, Literature, and Publishing

Fall 2018

In Fall of 2018 WLP assessed PB 204: Introduction to Book and Magazine Publishing, which was chosen for assessment due to its first time offering. In this assessment 18 final exams were collected and measured for alignment of the following objectives: “Students will become acquainted with the history and the current state of print publishing.” and “Students will have an initial understanding of what it means to create, distribute and promote content in a print environment, and how publishing differs from manufacturing and service industries.” Reviewers analyzed and  discussed each of the eighteen final exams/papers, discussing the strengths and weaknesses of each and ranked each as Outstanding, Accomplished or Needs More Work, according to the rubric. The results showed that these students had indeed learned the history and the current state of print publishing as well as gained a knowledge of what it means to create, distribute and promote content in a print environment, and how publishing differs from manufacturing and service industries, just as the course objectives stated.  By consensus, it was found that only one of the eighteen exams fell into the category of “Needs More Work.”  

Spring 2019

During the Spring 2019 school year the WLP department went under external review. Their results were shared and discussed among the department, along with the Office of Academic Assessment. In order to review this material, please contact the WLP department directly. 

Communication Sciences and Disorders

The CSD department wanted to create a systematic process for assessing criteria on the Comprehensive Examination given during the capstone of graduate students in the CSD department, which resulted in rubric development. The exam requires students to provide written responses to two clinical case studies of individuals with a communication disorder. In the written response students must provide a preassessment, assessment strategies, a summary statement, and intervention strategies. This exam assesses two things: how well the CSD department does as a graduate program, and the readiness of students as they embark on their clinical fellowship before they are certified by the Speech-Language-Hearing Association as Speech Language Pathologists. From this they piloted a rubric to assess criteria and streamline the process of grading and assessment for this examination. In order to begin the process of rubric development the department utilized Emerson's CWLO: communicate, critically think, create, civic engagement, and collaborate, from this stemmed a rubric. The rubric encorporated each part of the CWLO. The overall utilized communicate, the next criterion for pre-assessment utilized think critically, civic engagement, and collaborate; the criterion for assessment utilized the critically think, create, civic engagement, and collaborate; the summary portion of the rubric was a standalone piece that did not incorporate the CWLOs; and the intervention plan criterion utilized critically think, create, and civic engagment. 

Communication Studies

For the 2017-2018 School year, the Department of Communication Studies assessed CC 100: Fundamentals of Speech Communication. The assessment of this course was brought about due to its strong alignment with Emerson College’s SLOs. In this process the students were evaluated and recorded giving their first speech of the semester, which serves as a baseline for the students’ skills as they begin the course. Students are then recorded and evaluated giving their last speech in the class, which acts as a final exam to showcase the skills learned and applied throughout the semester. The findings indicate that the following challenges occurred, including the utilization and application of digital and information literacy in oral communication, the need to increase the commitment to honoring diverse perspectives, and the need to work on achieving more synthesis of skills as they apply to individuals in specific skills and situations. These challenges were addressed and changes were implemented or responded to through a process of planning and revising.  

Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies

Spring 2018

In the spring semester of 2018, the ILAIS conducted an assessment project as a follow-up to one conducted in 2014. This assessment process utilized the First Year Seminar (FYS) students that first participated in Fall of 2014.  The participation for this process 2018 began with email inquiry and invitation to participate in the online follow-up study, which assessed attitudes and beliefs about their academic ability, attitude, interest, and psychological well-being over the course of their time at Emerson from the first semester of their freshman year to the last weeks of their senior year. Throughout this process students agreed to allow access to their academic records that included standardized test scores. Three scales were utilized for Academic Engagement including the Academic Motivation scale, the Positive Attitude Towards Literacy scale (PATL), and the Need for Cognition scale (NFC). The Academic Motivation scale was an eight-item scale that assessed students’ academic and intellectual engagement, this scale included questions about the students’ approach to coursework, grades, intellectual activities, and academic activities and experiences. This scale was developed by the Wabash National Study of Liberal Arts Education (WNSLAE). The Positive Attitude Toward Literacy scale was a six-item questionnaire that measure student enjoyment of literature, science, history, and “expressing ideas in writing”, this scale was scored the same as Academic Motivation and was also developed by WNSLAE. The Need for Cognition scale was an 18-item questionnaire that examined whether each student had a tendency to engage in and enjoy cognitive based activities, which helps to predict academic efficacy and student success. For Psychological Well being the Ryff Psychological Well-Being Scale (PWBS) was used. This is a 54-item questionnaire that assesses six core components of well-being, including positive relationships, autonomy, environmental mastery, personal growth, purpose in life, and self-acceptance. The next area to assess was Background Characteristics which included gender, ethnicity, international or domestic status; first language; medical/psychological diagnoses, learning difficulties, parental education, high school GPA, and SAT/ACT scores. Lastly, Academic Self-Efficacy was assessed through a sixteen-item academic efficacy scale that was developed by the reviewers. This scale measured students’ confidence in participating in class, writing a research paper. And study and managing their time productively, which were then calculated by subscale, the  score was an aggregate of the three subscales. The findings showed that there was a 55% participation rate. In terms of Academic Engagement from 2014-2018, Academic Motivation, PATL, and NFC showed little change in terms of engagement or interest in literacy. However, the results indicated a significant increase in the NFC in terms of intellectual inquiry and the tendency to inquire, which highlights a positive growth in development of intellectual engagement. The area of Academic Self-Efficacy from freshman to senior year showed growth in confidence and academic ability, while noting that students still did not feel comfortable in areas of research and writing. The area of Psychological Well-being saw a small upward trend in terms of personal growth, sense of purpose, and satisfaction with relationships, but ultimately those findings were not statistically significant. 

Journalism

Through Summer and Fall of 2018, the journalism department continue to work on rubric development aligning learning objective with each tier to begin the process. The faculty collaborated to follow the process of alignment and rubric development, which was reflect in the Journalism Department's SLC reports from 2019 and 2020. 

Marketing Communication

Fall 2018

In Fall 2018 the Marketing Communication Department mapped their student learning outcomes to the college-wide and departmental student learning objectives. One of the motivators for this project was due to department growth and the birth of new programs. This process sought to be an exploration and focused on creating a visual map of 100-400 level courses to provide a holistic overview for immediate impression results so that strengths, weaknesses, and areas of overlap could be identified. This project also served to work with SLO data to assist the college and the department in creating an inventory of SLOs and courses, that can be reviewed to understand not only the connection on the department and college-level learning objectives, but also develop an inventory of the course material, creating a current snap-shot of course SLOs, reading, and approach, from which to guide the department regarding crafting and/or iterating the overall MK-course experience.

Findings from the 100 and 200 level courses:

• Takeaways included that department SLOs were “generally well distributed across courses, with certain exceptions”

• The group doing the analysis stated that one challenge is that “syllabi are generally not constructed to clearly represent departmental learning objectives.” The recommendation was to standardize or align syllabi.

• Analysis also included that two department SLOs “that were not clearly identified were diversity and ethics”

Findings from the 300 and 400 level courses:

•  Found “general consistency” with both the department goals and the college-wide goals

•    Some syllabi specifically stated SLOs in alignment with the mission of the department and college

•    A larger number of the syllabi incorporated the goals via reading, assignments and final projects

•    Under Civic Engagement, and within the department, the value of “Diversity” was marked as “present” through the Diversity statement included in the syllabi, but only one course: MK346"

An overall concern raised in reviewing the previous reports was the lack of transparency of data  due to noted assumptions, as well as the greater challenge of evolving creation and iteration of courses impacted by changing faculty and/or response to feedback on courses.While mapping of SLOs could be done visually, from the existing data, the knowledge that it had most likely changed—as well as the need to have an “at a glance” system for MK-course SLOs for both the department and the college to work from—required exploring the best way to inventory data from current department syllabi. The details and steps to change are expressed in greater detail in the full report. 

Performing Arts

For the 2017-2018 School year, the department of Performing Arts focused on activities in the Musical Theater Program. The process sought to assess TH 221: Musical Theater Scene Study (and DA 237: Jazz) and TH 428: Musical Theatre Style II.  They assessed students based on the following SLOs “Identify and accomplish stage actions and character goals.”; “Use their singing voices effectively.”; and “Comport themselves professionally.” TH 221 and DA 237 were assessed together, randomly selecting 5 students and scoring on a rubric based on the following criteria: character development, vocal quality, movement quality, and interpretation/preparation. Each of the five student’s scores were averaged based on the previously listed criteria, scored from one to four  and the results showed that the average for character development was 3.4, the average for vocal quality was 3.6, the average for movement quality was 2.6,  the average forinterpretation/preparation was 3.8, which brought a combined average of 3.4, which was compared to similar analysis conducted in 2009 which showed a mean of 3.3, thus concluding growth in these courses. The second part of the assessment process focuses on TH 428: Musical Theatre Styles II. This measuredcharacter development, vocal quality, and interpretation/preparation. A total of 14 students were enrolled in the course and each were assessed on the above criteria, on a scale of one to four. The results showed that the average for character development was 3.4, the average for vocal quality was 3.4,the average for interpretation/preparation was 3.5,  which brought a combined average of 3.4. When compared to similar criteria from 2010 it showed the earlier iterations of the class had a higher average in terms of criteria based on vocals, musicianship, physicality, and performance. These comparative analyses and assessment of student progress helped to identify areas of weakness and pinpoint further action steps for the program.  

Visual and Media Arts

In the 2017-2018 school year the VMA department conducted a study with a random selection of students from the freshman, sophomore, and junior year cohorts. Through this process 14 students were sampled and their works uploaded for assessment. This was an anonymous process that sought to collect data and measure the degree to which students are reaching the required educational benchmarks. From the freshman cohort three students were sampled, from the sophomore cohort five students were sampled, and from the junior cohort six students were sampled. The sampled works included exams that included identifying key work and essays, essays, podcasts, screenplays, a short documentary, and short fiction videos. These works were assessed for alignment with VMA's SLOs. The reviewers for this process found that the quality of work from the examples provided were uneven, ranging from encouraging responses to barely meeting the instructor's expectations. As the reviewers looked at the progression through the curriculum, they found that there was an uneven quality, lack of insight, and lack of ambition across all cohorts, finding that there were only a few successful examples that met objectives and provided adequate responses to the assignments. The committee that took the time to review this process will continue their efforts to track those sampled in the project and look to see if growth and success have occurred in achieving and meeting the objectives and expectations. 

Writing, Literature, and Publishing

Fall 2017

In Fall of 2017, LI 203: Literatures in English was chosen as the course to assess for the Student Learning Committee. This process utilized the Written Communication VALUE rubric as a guide for this process. Eighteen final essays were collected following the assignment description in the syllabus that stated “students will write a final paper of 9-12 pages in length analyzing some text or combination of texts in terms of the concerns of the course and making appropriate use of secondary sources.” The collected essays were reviewed and ranked according to the rubric, where faculty utilized key phrases and concepts to rank student work. The summary of findings indicated that students who employed a focused thesis statement wrote the strongest essays.  Topic selection and narrowing of focus were keys to making a strong argument.  The incorporation of secondary sources, when used properly, brought to the essay a give and take where the student wrestled with these positions and learned to adopt and defend their own. A numerical synthesis of the eighteen essays produced a score of approximately 2.9 out of the highest mark of 4.  One essay, which scored a 1.00 significantly lowered the average. This assessment gave the department an opportunity to look back as well as forward at their curriculum. 

Spring 2018

In Spring of 2018 WLP assessed LI 211: Global Indigenous Literatures. In this assessment 17 final essays were collected and reviewed for alignment with the learning objective “students are expected to gain a basic understanding about the diversity of the world’s indigenous peoples, and explore how they have used literary writing to convey information about their histories, cultures, and politics.” The assignment instruction asked students to make an extended argument on a work of American literature, or to compare themes or characters from multiple works. After reviewing the student works against the Written Communication Value Rubric. The results showed that the students achieved a basic understanding about the diversity of the world’s indigenous peoples and their literary work, just as the course objective stated.  Further, that understanding, as expressed in these essays, aligns with the college’s commitment to diversity and inclusion, as written in its mission statement, particularly, “to promote civic engagement.”  There were lapses in grammar, punctuation, and even some cursory analyses among the essays, but the overall body of work was strong, well-written, and perceptively analyzed.

Communication Sciences and Disorders

Communication Studies 

Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies

In the 2016-2017 school year the ILAIS SLC members focused their assessment on two goals, the first goal “refine and clarify overarching Liberal Arts goals” and the second being “design and implement an assessment process to evaluate student learning against one of the four perspective outcomes”. The findings for goal one did not align with the direction of the curriculum development, nor were they aligned with the college wide learning outcomes. This process led to refinement of the Liberal Arts goals to better align with the college wide student learning outcomes. The updated goals indicate that the Liberal Arts curriculum aims to provide students with a: 

1. First-year curriculum that supports the development of core communication (written and oral), information literacy, and critical and creative thinking skills.
2. Foundation in the major Liberal Arts traditions (i.e. arts and humanities, social and behavioral sciences, literature and language, and natural sciences and quantitative reasoning) 
3. Set of core competencies associated with ethical conduct, interdisciplinary analysis, and respect for diversity of experience and opinion.
4. Sequenced Liberal Arts curriculum that supports and connects to students’ educational experiences in Communication and the Arts.

A second objective of the 2016/2017 assessment process was to move beyond the piecemeal assessment of individual course SLO’s and to instead focus assessment efforts at the level of the Perspectives’ curriculum. The basis of assessment followed the SLO : Exercise critical and flexible thinking in engaging primary texts, whether they be readings, data, art works, or visual texts. 

2017 Perspective Report

The 2017 ILAIS assessment project assessed Critical Thinking in the perspectives’ curriculum. Through planning and organization, the team members for this project decided on a process that used standardized critical thinking test rather than sampling student work. The sample of students was indicated by the Registrar’s Office, which identified 790 juniors and seniors that completed their Perspectives curriculum, while also providing their names and contact information. The students were contacted through a research participation email and were to respond via a doodle poll. The response rate was low, where only 32 students responded, and 28 participated in the ACT test. The team utilized ACT Collegiate Assessment of Academic Proficiency (ACT CAAP)—Critical Thinking Module. The ACT CAAP modules are a series of standardized test that evaluate students’ level of competence in a range of subjects typically addressed in postsecondary education programs. The CAAP Critical Thinking test is “a 32-item, 40-minute test that measures students’ skills in clarifying, analyzing, evaluating, and extending arguments.” (http://www.act.org/caap/tests/thinking.html).  In this test students are presented with four passages in the form of case studies, debates, dialogue, or statistical argument that are based on a topic or issue that might be addressed in Liberal Arts curricula. Students had to respond to eight multiple choice question and each of the four passages. The score ranges were 40 for the lowest to 80 for the highest. Emerson Students’ Mean: 66.3 (sd 5.5; range 58 - 71); National Sample (n = 5773) Mean: 59.5 (sd 5.5). The large majority of the students scored at or above the national mean for critical thinking, while one third of the sample scored at or above the 90^th percentile. This finding indicated that students who completed the perspectives requirements are performing as expected or better than expected in terms of critical thinking. It is also worth noting that students in the Writing, Literature, and Publishing department achieved the highest score and had the strongest showing. 

Journalism 

In the 2016-2017 school year the Journalism department completed a two-year assessment of curriculum, approved the implementation of five measurable programmatic SLOs and created SLOs for each tier, therefore ensuring that each tier followed a learner centered curriculum model. The new curriculum and SLOs addressed issues that occurred in the current program, which included inconsistencies, lack of structure, avoidance of digital skills leading to continued teaching of repetitive teaching, curriculum adaptability, desire to explore, and weak learner engagement. The new curriculum that was developed during this process increased the level of rigor within the curriculum, and from there the course redesigned occurred. As part of the curricular upgrade, the following courses were added and rolled out in the 2017-2018 school year including: Covering Immigration, Cultural Criticism, Data Visualization, History of Alternative Press, and Literary Journalism. This new roll out was presented to the Undergraduate Curriculum Committee and Academic affairs, where it was well received. 

Marketing Communication

The Department of Marketing Communication spent the 2016-2017 Academic Year mapping SLOs of the 300 and 400 level classes to the College Wide Learning Outcomes, which followed the mapping of the SLOs from the 100 and 200 Level courses in '15-'16 AY.  This process reviewed the following SLOs: 1. Understand and discuss the fundamental connections between communication and society in contemporary culture.; 2. Understand and explain the organizational structures of institutions and industries within the marketing communication landscape.; 3. Collaborate effectively and respectfully in a team.; 4. Write professionally, communicate effectively, and articulate original ideas in marketing communication.; 5. Demonstrate competency in delivering written and oral presentations.; 6. Develop and demonstrate creative and critical thinking skills to define and solve a marketing problem or identify and take advantage of a market opportunity.; 7. Convert consumer insights into actionable decisions in order to develop marketing communication strategies and tactics.; 8. Review academic literature, develop research questions, collect and analyze data, and make strategic recommendations.; 9. Make evidence-based decisions to develop marketing strategies and tactics designed to meet an organization’s goals and objectives.; 10. Create an integrated marketing communication campaign.; 11. Apply marketing analytics to measure, analyze and manage the performance of marketing communication initiatives.; 12. Conduct research and write a research paper or report in the appropriate academic or professional style that draws upon relevant marketing and communication theory and practices.; 13. Promote the understanding of diversity and inclusiveness among people in a global society.; and 14. Apply the ethical principles that govern the marketing communication profession. These SLOS were analyzed to align with the Emerson SLOs under the categories of Create, Communicate, Collaborate, Critically Think, and Civically Engage.The analysis found general consistency with the goals of the college and those of the department. While several courses specifically listed learning objectives in line with the mission statement of the college and the department, the majority of the syllabi analyzed incorporated them in readings, in-class assignments, and final projects.

Performing Arts

In the 2016-2017 school year, Performing Arts completed two assessments for the Student Learning Committee. The first activity assessed courses within the PA department. The primary focus was on acting courses, as that area had been in the process of reorganizing acting programs, therefore leading to assessment of those course. The assessment resulted in revisions to outcomes, course mapping, and rubrics. Two required acting courses: TH 221: Acting Studio I  and TH 425L Acting Studio III, which were designed to address the six SLOs for the Acting Program. The courses were assessed based on a rubric that looked at learning outcomes which focused on character development, vocal quality, movement quality, and interpretation/preparation.  The evaluation of TH 221: Acting Studio I included six students that were randomly selected by another faculty member in the program. When evaluating against the rubric students were scored on a scale of one to four. The average score for character development was 3, the average score for vocal quality was 2.2, the average score for movement quality was 2.5, and the average for interpretation/preparation was 3.  TH 425 was then evaluated. In this process 15 students were evaluated. The average score for character development was 3.7, the average score for vocal quality was 3.3, the average score for movement quality 3.7, lastly, the average score for interpretation/preparation was 3.5. These scores highlight the difference of scores and measure the process of learning from the first acting class to the capstone class. 

Visual and Media Arts

Writing, Literature, and Publishing

Fall 2016

In Fall of 2016 WLP assessed LI 203: British Literature, which collected a sample of 15 works within the course. However, the results of this assessment were nulled due to a dilemma in the scoring process. As a result, another course was examined for spring semester. 

Spring 2017

In Spring of 2017, WLP assessed LI 423: Topics in Global Literature: Cultural Translation. The department chose to assess this course, because it pairs well with LI 120, which had previously been assessed. By assessing LI 423, faculty were able to create a comparison of what students learned over their four years in the WLP program. For this process, fifteen final essays were gathered. The findings showed extremely positive results in areas of mechanics, and structure, along with high scorings in research, thesis, and structure. This assessment process shows that by the time students reach the highest level (LI 423/Seminar) they are able to achieve the outcomes that have been imparted on them over their four years in the program. 

Communication Sciences and Disorders

For the 2015-2016 school year, the SLC report and assessment focused on CD193, Introduction to Communication Disorders.  Goal was to explore extent to which students' performance in the course's capstone experience addressed the overall learning outcomes in the CD major.  Standard process was followed: committee of 3-4 instructors who teach undergraduate courses is formed.  Once course that is to provide evidence of student learning is identified, student are randomly selected and instructor collects sample work and provides it to committee.  Committee reviews work using an agreed upon rubric. The assessment of student work revealed that work was of high quality, so no further recommendations were made with regard to changes to the course.

Communication Studies

The goal for 2016 was to expand departmental assessment efforts beyond CC100 course.  A goal related to diversity and inclusion was selected as part of earlier commitment to expanding focus on this area.  Instructors from two different sections of CC203 Intercultural Communication were selected to participate in the assessment, based on similar assigned designed to assess diversity and inclusion learning goals. Each instructor submitted 3 out of 5 final group projects (randomly selected) and a rubric was developed and used to measure student learning as described in the SLO.  Student received an average score of 3.3 out of 5 on the understanding of global diversity SLO and an average score of 2.9 on the understanding of individuality SLO.  In response to these findings, instructors were advised to make course objectives more measurable and to consider them when designing learning objectives for individual assignments to ensure that all course objectives are being met in a way that is measurable and transparent to the students.

Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies

Reviewed and refined goals to align with college wide learning outcomes. Please see 2017 section for a more in-depth synopsis of this report.

Journalism

In the 2015-16 school year ,the Journalism Department, led by its undergraduate curriculum committee developed four learning principles –Discover, Adapt, Illuminate Respect or DAIR –to guide its learner-centered curricular development. It organized student learner experiences in its effort to create a Learner-Centered Curriculum (Cullen, Harris & Hill)and began to develop a structure for developing programmatic SLOs and goals with increasing rigor for different levels of the curriculum. This work was furthered through the 2016-2017 school year to reflect the programmatic SLOs. 

Marketing Communication

During the 2015-2016 school year, the Marketing Communication Department spent their time focusing on mapping their student learning outcomes. This project sought to examine whether or not all SLOs in Marketing Communication were covered in the curriculum spanning all four years/ levels (100-400 level) of the program.  This process reviewed syllabi from MK 120, 121, 220, 221, which are the core courses for Marketing Communication curriculum.  This process reviewed the following SLOs: 1. Understand and discuss the fundamental connections between communication and society in contemporary culture.; 2. Understand and explain the organizational structures of institutions and industries within the marketing communication landscape.; 3. Collaborate effectively and respectfully in a team.; 4. Write professionally, communicate effectively, and articulate original ideas in marketing communication.; 5. Demonstrate competency in delivering written and oral presentations.; 6. Develop and demonstrate creative and critical thinking skills to define and solve a marketing problem or identify and take advantage of a market opportunity.; 7. Convert consumer insights into actionable decisions in order to develop marketing communication strategies and tactics.; 8. Review academic literature, develop research questions, collect and analyze data, and make strategic recommendations.; 9. Make evidence-based decisions to develop marketing strategies and tactics designed to meet an organization’s goals and objectives.; 10. Create an integrated marketing communication campaign.; 11. Apply marketing analytics to measure, analyze and manage the performance of marketing communication initiatives.; 12. Conduct research and write a research paper or report in the appropriate academic or professional style that draws upon relevant marketing and communication theory and practices.; 13. Promote the understanding of diversity and inclusiveness among people in a global society.; and 14. Apply the ethical principles that govern the marketing communication profession. These SLOS were analyzed to align with the Emerson SLOs under the categories of Create, Communicate, Collaborate, Critically Think, and Civically Engage.  From this process it was suggested that the courses work to standardize or align their syllabi to avoid redundancy, to set clear expectations, and to align outcomes across the courses and the major. 

Performing Arts 

In the 2015-2016 school year the Performing Arts Department focused on two areas. Area One included  focusing on the courses  TH 215: World Drama I, TH 216: Drama II, and PA 101 : Languages of the Stage. These three courses are part of the core curriculum that is required of all PA students. Area Two focuses on the continuation of mapping learning goals to align with those of Emerson College. 

Visual and Media Arts

For the 2015-2016 Academic Year the Department of Visual and Media Arts collected the work of six freshman (randomly selected), then another six were sampled the following year, and another six in the third year, and the last set of six students within the fourth year creating an over all sample of 24 students, simply put it was 6 students per year for four years. In order to effectively sample the student works, faculty members received communication detailing the process and collection of works, which included an anonymous process and one where students were unaware that this sampling was occurring. The purpose of following this process was to establish an ongoing model of assessment of student learning. The results showed that the first sample yielded results that were mixed, but reflected commonalities of elementary knowledge and foundation, but they found that the process worked well and that the data was promising. From this process the reviewing committee suggested that the process have a streamlined scoring approach, clarity on both the guidelines for the project and guidelines for the assignment, and creating a numerical evaluation range. The results and recommendations of this report were also shared with the curriculum committee. 

Writing, Literature, and Publishing

During the 2015-2016 Academic Year the WLP Department assessed the graduate level writing workshop: WR 608.  Each of the students in the Flash Fiction workshop, WR 608, were required to write one or two stories each week, read widely in the form, analyze various markets for submitting their work for publication, create their own exercise in the form based on a story they admire, create an artists book for their Nano Fiction, and contribute to a class anthology. At the end of the semester, students were asked to assemble their own individual Flash Fiction Collection. Each collection included a Title, a short description/flap copy, a Table of Contents, a minimum of eight stories, a short bio note, and blurbs by writers. 
In addition, they were asked to write a short essay in which they discuss their revision process, their new or increased understanding of the form, what they learned, and how they felt about their Individual Flash Collection.  The project findings showed that the final story collections were impressive, and demonstrated that the Learning Objectives for the course had been met. Faculty were pleased to see that each student's collection contained stories of publishable quality, and several stories have already been published. This is especially gratifying because most of the students had not worked in this short form before this workshop.