2019-2020 Assessment Initiative Awards
In an effort to support continuous improvement, the Assessment Initiative Award program provides financial and professional support to cover some of the costs of conducting assessment studies or program evaluation.
The award program provides five awards of $2,000 each to individuals or teams proposing projects that will assess outcomes at the program or department/school/unit level (no single course assessment proposals will be considered). The application materials (proposal narrative, itemized budget, and supporting letter) will be reviewed by members of the Assessment Advisory Council and University Assessment Services staff.
For more information, see the guidelines and contact us if you have any questions. Application materials are due on Friday, October 18, 2019, and can be emailed to University Assessment Services at assessment@IllinoisState.edu.
Recent award recipients include:
- Designing online dashboards to integrate multiple direct and indirect measures of student learning in the Recreation and Park Administration program to assist in reviewing and interpreting this information and then using this information for program improvement and disseminating it to program stakeholders.
- Considering additional preparation (knowledge/skills and confidence) needed by students in the World Language teacher education programs for their oral proficiency requirements by seeking additional training on the oral interview assessment and developing instructional materials to better prepare students.
- Administering focus groups to supplement survey responses regarding student learning and better assess the efficacy of student participation in one-day, co-curricular community service/service learning experiences through the Center for Community Engagement and Service Learning.
- Developing and piloting a multi-semester assessment of the English teacher education program to better incorporate existing program-level assessments and benefit multiple stakeholders including students, faculty, clinical mentors, university supervisors, and cooperating teachers.
- Improving retention of underrepresented students by the Retention and Assessment unit of University College through examining students' previous educational experiences with multiple methods and informants and encouraging support and community among these students.
- Revising assessment processes within newer graduate-level programs in the Department of Chemistry given the online format in which these programs are delivered and a consideration of how more 'traditional' assessments may not be as appropriate.