About

The Office of Assessment collects student work samples from your course’s Essential Assignment(s). These work samples are used to measure student achievement of the Category Specific Learning Outcomes (CSLO) throughout the university. Here are some key facts about the Core Education Assessment Process:

  • All Core Education courses must have an identified Essential Assignment for each CSLO. The same assignment can be used for multiple CSLOs.
  • Canvas will be used by the Assessment Office to access the student work. The instructor should confirm that all student work is in Canvas, allowing the Assessment Office to access it.
  • The Assessment Office will work with faculty with unusual submission circumstances.
  • Staff from the Assessment Office will work to anonymize the student work to make individual student identification difficult. The work will then be processed for scoring.
  • The student work will be scored using category specific assessment rubrics. The scoring will be done by OSU Faculty Assessment Fellows made up of faculty from the category. If you are interested in being a Faculty Assessment Fellow please complete the form here.
  • The results of the category assessment will only be reported at the institutional level. No results will be disaggregated for individual courses or classes. The assessment results will be reviewed by the Core Education Committee of the Faculty Senate, and will eventually be available to the entire OSU community.

 

What is an Essential Assignment?

Essential Assignments:

  • Help students make meaning of their work by connecting individual, course, and Core Ed learning goals.
  • Prompt students to identify meaningful learning experiences throughout their Core Ed courses, reinforcing what is relevant and useful to transfer to their major courses and beyond.
  • Help instructors communicate their learning goals to students and fellow instructors and further our community and engagement to quality teaching and learning.

All Core Education courses will include at least one assignment that directly measures each stated category student learning outcome. These assignments are integral to the course to provide meaningful and authentic assessments of how well students are achieving all required learning outcomes. Each course can use one to three assignments to assess all required outcomes, with seven types of Essential Assignments that can be used for this purpose.

The 7 Essential Assignment Types:

  • Collection- A selection of student work, which in their totality, address at least one learning outcome
  • Presentation- A speech or a talk in which a new product, idea, or piece of work is shown and explained to an audience
  • Paper- A written work of specified length on a topic, in one of several forms, e.g., research paper, position paper, essay, article, story, poem, script, libretto, etc.
  • Project- A planned undertaking, usually in the form of a response to a task or problem engaged in by students
  • Reflection- A written statement arising from serious thought or consideration given to the examination and/or exploration of how the writer has changed, developed, or grown from experience or interaction with some subject matter, idea, or purpose
  • Examination- Usually scored using an interval scale that provides a number of points earned as the measure of achievement
  • Performance/Production- A literary (e.g., story, poem, play, libretto, essay, critique), artistic work (music, dance, drama, visual art, media),  or practical skill (scientific lab) presented or exhibited to the public on stage, screen, or in a physical or digital space

 

Requirements for Creating Essential Assignments

  • The specific assignment instructions and details can be different across sections, but all sections use the same type of assignment.
  • The essential assignment is a major form of assessment for the learning outcome.
    • It counts toward the final course grade.
    • All students are required to complete the assignment.
    • It is a culminating assessment, conducted after the learning outcome has been taught (and not a pre-test or early formative assignment).
  • Completed student work for the essential assignment is a single submission for the overall assessment of the category.
  • The essential assignment doesn’t have to be the only assignment in the course that assesses the learning outcome, but it’s the only assignment that will be submitted for category assessment.

The results of this assessment will not be used to certify/decertify any course.

 

What Do You Need to Do Now?

When ready to begin, you can prepare for the Qualtrics Assessment Submission form linked below by reading these detailed instructions. It is important that you have the Canvas URL for the Essential Assignment(s) and ensure that student work has been uploaded into Canvas before completing the form. 

If you are submitting for more than one course, please complete the form again individually for each course.

Qualtrics Assessment Submission Form Link

 

If you have any questions, please contact members of the University Assessment Team: Kristin Nagy Catz, [email protected], Heath Henry, [email protected], or Nancy Barbour, [email protected]