Assessment Across Two Cultures: Professional Schools and Arts & SciencesNEASC 126th Annual Meeting and ConferenceDecember 7-9, 2011

José-Marie Griffiths, Ph.D.Vice President for Academic AffairsBryant UniversitySmithfield, Rhode Island

Bryant University Overview

• Founded in 1863• 3,370 full-time and part-time undergraduate

students from 27 states (plus the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and Palau) and 54 countries

• 87% of undergraduates reside on campus • 244 full-time and part-time graduate students in

three master's programs • Accreditations:

– NEASC - New England Association of Schools and Colleges

– The College of Business - AACSB International, a distinction given to less than 5% of business schools worldwide

Bryant University Overview continued

• 98% of faculty hold Ph.D’s or the highest degree in their discipline

• College of Arts & Sciences– Bachelor of Arts (10 majors)– Bachelor of Science (5 majors)– Master of Arts in Teaching

• College of Business– Bachelor of Science in Business Administration (8 concentrations)– Bachelor of Science in Information Technology– Bachelor of Science in International Business (6 concentrations)– Master of Business Administration (MBA)– Master of Professional Accountancy (MPAc)– Master of Taxation (MST)

• All College of Arts & Sciences degree students take a Business minor

• All College of Business degree students take an Arts & Sciences minor

Mission Statement

To provide a student-centered Bryant Experience that promotes academic excellence and cultivates the leadership skills, qualities of character and diverse perspectives required to succeed in an age of unlimited global opportunity.

Assessment at Bryant

• Process not project• Value not an outcome• Teaching best practice• Accountability commitment

Developing & Implementing Assessment

• Program not faculty being evaluated• Need to change faculty perspectives on

assessment – not just an overhead task• Requires careful design of the structure,

process and participation in the assessment• Communication of the process – clarifying

expectations, tasks, roles and responsibilities

• Important to have an internal champion

Developing & Implementing Assessment continued

• More mature process in our College of Business

• Fewer faculty within each discipline in Arts & Sciences – makes it more difficult

• Once assessment is routinized need to:– develop a continuous review of relevance and currency of

learning goals

– identify how to support faculty to improvetheir teaching

– Embrace and encourage the notion of teaching as scholarly work as well as good practice

– Institutionalize incentivize and reward the scholarship of teaching and learning

What Are We Doing Now?

• Are revising our general education foundations curriculum

• Looking at capstone courses to demonstrate performance on institutional outcomes

• Longitudinal assessments• Developing fluency in assessment

languages