On the current state of assessment …

Since the 1980s I’ve seen nothing but growth and interest in assessment and in the use of the information it provides. In 1979, Tennessee was the first state to provide performance funding for higher education. Now thirty states have funding of some sort for this purpose.

In 1988, William Bennett (then Secretary of Education) said schools should incorporate outcomes assessment into their programs if they wanted to be approved for funding. This was the beginning of the assessment movement.  At one point, there was consideration of a test that would be administered to all college graduates. I was part of a group that did some work on this project. Congress looked at it, and we explained that it was going to be very expensive. When it came up for a vote, the 1994 Congress didn’t want to spend the money.

AACSB was among many organizations that took early steps and got a number of institutions to work on assessment. They did some early important work on the Learning Assessment Center concept. Until recently, assessment has not been very important in the accrediting process. I know of one school, several years ago, that didn’t even address assessment until about a month before their re-accreditation. They said that, since it was an AACSB accreditation, and AACSB didn’t emphasize assessment, it wasn’t important. So, I think the new emphasis in the new accreditation standards is very important. We are coming back to an emphasis on assessment.

On where learning assessment is going …

There is pressure on all of us to show evidence of what we’re doing and whether or not it’s working. This pressure is only going to increase in the future.

Regional accrediting associations are, in some instances, very committed to assessment of learning. At the so-called central level of many universities, wherever that may be, there is a culture that is very supportive of assessment. Most people, even those who don’t like it, are acknowledging that this isn’t going to go away.

___________

Trudy W. Banta is Professor of Higher Education and Vice Chancellor for Planning and Institutional Improvement at Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis.  She has written or edited numerous published volumes on assessment, contributed over 20 chapters to other published works, and written more than 150 articles and reports. Her two recent books include Assessment Essentials, with Catherine Palomba, and Building a Scholarship of Assessment.  She is the founding editor of Assessment Update, a bi-monthly periodical.