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"Assess This": Lessons Learned from a 12-Month Access Assessment Project. Emily Quinn, M.Ed. Tyler Johnson, M.Ed. Joshua Mason, M.Ed . Disability Resource Center University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Conference Inclusion Statement.
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"Assess This": Lessons Learned from a 12-Month Access Assessment Project Emily Quinn, M.Ed.Tyler Johnson, M.Ed.Joshua Mason, M.Ed. Disability Resource Center University of Tennessee at Chattanooga
Conference Inclusion Statement We ask you to join us in creating a culture that reflects… Access and Inclusion and Civility and Respect …this week and in all aspects of our organization.
Why Assessment? • "Let's get better." • Understand the students with whom you work • Find out what you do well and what you need to improve • Challenge the vulnerability that occurs when you're stagnant • Acknowledge patterns in utilization of resources • Review the effectiveness of your programs and services • Communicate in universal language with administration and colleagues in other departments • Collect and share data to help frame disability culture on campus
Overview & Learning Objectives Goal 1: Participants will identify challenges associated with and strategies for implementation of assessment in disability services. Action Plan: Presenters will explain and show examples of a framework for engaging in assessment and discuss with participants Goal 2: Participants will reflect on current practices and strategies for assessment implementation in their own higher education setting. Action Plan: Presenters will explain process for developing an assessment plan and participants will work through a template plan.
Activity Step One: Learning Objectives • What is a critical element of your work right now? • What do you want to know? • Take a minute to draft one or two measurable learning objectives.
Project Overview • Structure & Timeline • A 'team within the team' responsible for assessment guidance • Leadership member, DRC coordinator, & Mosaic coordinator • CAS (Council for Advancement of Standards in Higher Education) • July 2018 – July 2019 • Monthly education, workshop, and assessment review with full staff • Assessment team coordinated projects, but all staff were involved in consultation and implementation • Department programming funds contingent upon assessment plan (not outcome)
Administrative Goals • "Let's get better." • Improve individual staff competency • Improve services for students • Tell our story powerfully and more frequently • Understand perceptions and expectations for our department • Align department goals, division goals, and UTC goals
Administrative Challenges • Building assessment base knowledge for a full team • Developing and implementing assessment takes administrative time • “Buy in” from a full team with a range of responsibilities, goals, and opinions • Last minute and reactive assessment plans are hard to manage
Disability Resource Center Assessment Report
DRC: Assessing Operations • Accommodate: students served, disability categories, accommodations used • Uses: Funding, advertising, internal training, departmental collaboration, external training for faculty, staff and students • Next steps: • Use of current data for position alignment and funding • Assess timeliness of accommodation provision • Assess quality of accommodation provision
DRC: Assessing Operations2018/2019 Academic Year Disability Frequency
DRC: Assessing Operations • 2018/2019 Academic Year Disability Frequency • Data analysis yielded increase of students requesting accommodations due to impacts mental health diagnoses • Information used to initiate collaboration and internal training with UTC Counseling • Next steps: training for UTC faculty and staff
DRC: Assessing Academic Coaching • Qualtrics: students served, frequency of meetings, topics covered, & campus resource referrals • Uses: Funding for additional staff positions due to demand, internal and external training, collaboration with similar university service providers • Next steps: • Assess efficacy of academic coaching and redundancies/partnerships with similar university supports
DRC: Assessing Academic Coaching • Spring 2019 Topics: • Data analysis yielded access coordinators utilizing large number of hours for academic coaching • Data utilized to secure funding for additional academic coaching position • Next steps: training regarding high frequency topics such as college life balance
DRC: Assessing Programming • Paper: Attendance, Learning Outcomes • Uses: Funding, allocation of resources, efficacy of programming • Next steps: • Consider different programming modalities, revising high-attendance programming, create assessments for future remote-programming
DRC: Assessing ProgrammingAttendance Data Example: Spring Open House • Have you ever attended a DRC or Mosaic event before today (58 attendees, 42 responses)?
DRC: Assessing Programming • 2018/2019 Academic Year Program Attendance • DRC Open House was most highly attended program; technology tutorial sessions yielded low attendance throughout academic year • Information used to change resource allocation and modalities to online tutorials for technology and integration during DRC Open House programs • Next steps: create assessments for online tutorials
Mosaic Program Assessment Report
Mosaic & Assessment • Primary Format: • Utilized online platforms like Qualtrics and QuestionPro that help create the assessment. • Simple paper surveys. • Have alternate versions available
Mosaic & Assessment • Primary Uses: • Coaching Tracking & Effectiveness • Mosaic specific coaching effectiveness • Campus partnerships and collaboration • Programming Effectiveness • External Programming • Professional Development • Process Effectiveness • Understanding better whether current processes are sustainable and useful
Next Steps • Create a more sustainable system for assessment • Making sure that staff has access and understands process to initiate assessment • Stable systems allow for more streamlined efficiency • Present findings to staff for external use and understanding • Utilize and report findings to University and beyond
Activity Step Two: Methods • What are some options you can consider to gather information? • Compare and contrast the methods you can utilize to gather information about your topic.
Leadership • You don't have to be an assessment expert to do assessment! • When in doubt, choose a quick and easy-to-access method for collecting feedback. • Expect an ego-check when you review and analyze information. • Assessment is ongoing; it's not a one-time project.
DRC Coordinator • Electronic databases yield a wealth of valuable data • Communicating importance of data trends of student populations is challenging but vital • University-wide funding models align with data-driven programming • Proactive, thoughtful approaches to consideration of learning outcomes and assessment of programming is essential
Program Coordinator • There was more to learn from assessment than just what was going well or going poorly. • It is necessary to create a system of assessment that the whole office can participate in and buy in to. • It is not an overnight change. It takes time to effectively assess a program.
Strategies & Resources Create, Analyze, and & Tell Your Story
Create • Start with a simple question or thought. • Create learning objectives that are measurable and reportable. • Decide on a method or platform to use (or a combination) • Keep a quick template ready to edit and use • Identify potential models from which you can pull language, methods, and base questions
Analyze • Analyze using what is known and easily ready: Excel, Question Pro, PowerPoint, Google Sheets, etc.... • Built in analytics – training at your institution? • Reference the learning/program objectives you created as you review the results
Tell Your Story • Share outcomes with all department staff members • Quick, easy-to-remember data points can be pulled into many conversations • Everyone's on the same page, telling the same story • Publish key results from assessment projects to website and/or newsletter • Ask for what you need using the details that communicate the necessity of the request (funding, staffing, etc.)
Activity Step 3: Design Your Assessment • Review your learning outcomes • Choose a method • Draft a short assessment • Share with a partner for feedback
Session Evaluation Please see session moderator for paper evaluation form or complete the evaluation online.