The goals of the Office of Assessment are to:

• promote a Community of Practice (CoP) for collaboration and inquiry to share ideas, find solutions, and build innovations regarding student learning;

• support student learning outcomes as the core of faculty, student services, and workforce development work in order to strive for partnerships among campus educators while creating innovative learning experiences for students;

• create a resource center to provide a collaborative environment to engage faculty, staff, administrators, and the college community in outcome assessment practices;

• create a repository for required academic assessment reports and best practices in assessment that will be accessible to all faculty, administrators, staff, students, and other interested constituents;

• work collaboratively with academic departments and divisions to support assessment activities;

• strengthen the measurement of general education to develop student learning;

• maintain a website to increase the visibility, communication, and importance of assessment for student learning in all learning areas and modes of delivery;

• collaborate with curriculum management to integrate assessment evidence into the curriculum review process;

• integrate practices with curriculum, instructional design, distance learning, student services, community education, and workforce development.

Some of the activities to achieve these goals include the following:

• developing, scheduling, presenting, and coordinating campus assessment activities such as workshops and training (in coordination with division and college assessment committees);

• maintaining an assessment web page that includes

  • minutes of the Assessment Committee meetings;

  • an assessment glossary,

  • frequently asked questions (FAQs);

  • best practices on campus;

  • information on assessment conferences;

  • reports from assessment conferences;

  • information on assessment instruments and their availability;

  • links to other assessment sites;

  • e-mail addresses (direct link) to co-chairs of the College Assessment Committee and Division Committee chairs;

  • other assessment news;

• disseminating an annual report written by the College Assessment Committee regarding assessment communication activities (based on information from division assessment committees);

• collaborating with division committees to provide support and mentoring.