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West Virginia University Office of the Provost

External Assessment Resources

Assessment Organizations

  • AACU's Value Rubrics are invaluable assessment tools and cover a wide range of common competencies, from written communication to critical thinking.
  • The AALHE is one of the premier national associations for assessment professionals and professional development in the country. Their annual conference is well worth the time.
  • The Chronicle of Higher Education is must-read stuff for best practices, national debates, and regulatory shifts, all of which often affect assessment professionals.
  • EAB is a best practices firm to which WVU belongs. It provides a lot of research, data, and information from partner institutions.
  • HLC's Criteria for Accreditation should be something every assessment professional knows chapter and verse. Their annual conference is still my preferred form of professional development.
  • Inside Higher Ed also has strong articles from time to time relating to assessment.
  • Linda Suskie's blog is a great place for anyone who deals with assessment to ask questions, get advice, and participate in the national discourse around assessment of learning.
  • Lumina Foundation's Degree Qualifications Profile is a learning-centered framework that can guide institutional assessment and curriculum practices.
  • National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment (NILOA) provides a wealth of research and resources on assessment, not the least of which is their regular survey of chief academic officers regarding assessment. 
  • POD (Professional and Organizational Development) Network has a number of resources that assessment professionals would benefit from.
  • The Virginia Assessment Group maintains a website that serves all of the state's colleges and universities by providing resources, information, communication, and annual events.

Institutional Assessment Websites

  • Cornell University has terrific resource from its Institutional Research and Planning office that guides faculty on how and when to survey students.
  • James Madison University has a great site that features professional development in assessment.
  • Purdue's Data Digest is an amazing example of forward facing institutional data that could be used for any number of assessment and evaluative purposes.
  • University of Hawaii at Manoa's Assessment Office's website is one of my personal favorites for a diverse range of resources.
  • The University of Maryland does great work on the assessment of assignments, courses, and programs through its gen ed program and Office of Undergraduate Studies.
  • University of Washington's Center for Teaching and Learning does amazing work on the evaluation of teaching including self-assessment, peer evaluation, and student evaluations. Assessment of learning features prominently in the self-assessment process.
  • The University of Wisconsin-Madison does an incredible wide range of assessment-related stuff on their Student Learning Assessment website.
  • The University of West Florida's Center for University Teaching, Learning and Assessment has a strong guide on how to write and evaluate graduate-level student learning outcomes.

Books

Assessment and Academic Evaluation
  • Assessing Student Learning, Linda Suskie
  • Assessment Clear and Simple, Barbara Walvoord
  • Foundations of Assessment, Natasha Jankowski et al
  • Prioritizing Academic Programs and Services: Reallocating Resources to Achieve Strategic Balance, Robert Dickeson
  • Research Design, John and J. David Creswell
  • Using Evidence of Student Learning, George Kuh et al

Teaching and Learning

  • Make It Stick: The Science of Successful Learning, Peter Brown
  • Small Teaching, James Lang
  • Teaching Naked, Jose Antonio Bowen
  • Why Don't Students Like School?, Daniel Willingham

Journals

Others

Nature, Nature Neuroscience, and Science keep readers up-to-date with all the hard science underlying the learning sciences.