Outcomes-Based Program Review: Closing Achievement Gaps In- and Outside the Classroom With Alignment to Predictive Analytics and Performance Metrics

Second Edition

This book introduces the reader to the principles of assessment of student learning outcomes in the context of program review, and illustrates how to implement a sustainable outcomes-based assessment program review process based on over 30 case studies of exemplary practice across a range of institutional types.

Since publication of the first edition just over a decade ago, the landscape of higher education has been transformed. With the emergence of competency-based education, the questioning of the value of a post-secondary degree, the explosion of neuroscientific research, the emphasis on metacognition, as well as demographic changes in who is going to college and why, new questions are being asked and new methods of collecting data have multiplied. This new edition retains the goals of the first--which is to inform institutional self-reflection of how well the organization is achieving its intended purpose--in a manner that is reflective, adaptive, and collaborative, but which recognizes today’s changed environment.

Among the new topics Marilee J. Bresciani Ludvik introduces in this edition is how to appropriately connect outcomes-based program review (OBPR) to performance indicators and predictive analytics and develop meaningful new performance metrics to inform our understanding of the student experience. She also addresses the intersection of OBPR with competency-based assessment, introduces the reader to new concepts and terminology, and demonstrates the implications of neuroscientific research for learning and development and how that influences OBPR design. All the cases, a signature feature of the first edition to illustrate best practice, have been replaced for this edition.

Bresciani Ludvik postulates the importance of developing institutions as learning organizations where OBPR is designed collaboratively between student services, academic services, business services professionals, and faculty.

Each chapter concludes with key learning points as well as questions for organizational leadership to promote ongoing professional development as institutions implement OBPR practices that are appropriate for their specific contexts.

Marilee J. Bresciani Ludvik is Professor for Postsecondary Education and Co-Director of the Center for Educational Leadership, Innovation, and Policy, San Diego State University. She was formerly Assistant Vice President for Institutional Assessment at Texas A&M University. She has conducted outcomes assessment for programs and courses and is frequently invited to present assessment workshops nationally and internationally.

Ralph Wolff is President of the Senior College Commission of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), a role he assumed in 1996. Prior to joining WASC, he founded and directed the Institute for Creative Thinking, which focused on leadership and change, an emphasis that has carried over to his work at WASC. During his term as president, he has led WASC to the forefront of accreditation as an agent of accountability and innovation by transforming the accreditation process to an outcomes and learning based model. His current efforts at the Commission include a redesign of the accreditation process that focuses on retention and graduation, defining degree outcomes more clearly, and opening the accreditation process to greater transparency.