Because learning doesnt just happen in class'

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Because learning doesnt just happen in class.
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The MJC SLO Training Program

• A No-nonsense look at Student Learning Outcomes
• How to Write a (measurable) Student Learning
  Objective
• Choosing the Best Assessment Tool
• Evaluating and Responding to Outcomes
• Documenting Your Efforts

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About Todays Workshop

• November 11, 2009

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The MJC SLO Training Program

• A No-nonsense Look at Student Learning Outcomes
• How to Write a (Measurable) Student Learning
  Objective
• Choosing the Best Assessment Tool
• Evaluating and Responding to Outcomes
• Documenting Your Efforts

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Who can benefit.

• Students
• Faculty
• Staff
• Administrators
• Community Members
• Advisory Committees
• Board Members

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Why are we here?

• Weve heard the buzz, but we dont know what SLOs
  are
• We dont know how what we do relates to SLOs
• We want to make sure the work we do matters to
  students
• We want to make smart decisions about how to
  improve our services
• We want to know how individual roles at the
  college are directly linked to student learning
• We care about our students and want them to be
  successful

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SESSION 1
A No-Nonsense look at
A No-Nonsense look at
SLOs
SLOs
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Shifting the Educational Paradigm

• From providing service creating success.
• From what is taught to what is learned.

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Times are changing.

• New insights into learning
• Unforeseen access to knowledge
• Changing student demographics
• Educational marketplace
• Changing global economy
• Feedback-driven global culture
• Requests for accountability

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What students need to survive.

• Initiative
• Independence
• Self-reliance
• Self-motivation
• Adequate preparation
• Transferable skills and knowledge

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Student Services

• At the heart of teaching essential life skills

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Some essential life skills and attitudes

• Self-respect
• Motivation
• Independent navigation of systems and processes
• Information seeking
• Teamwork
• Identifying and using resources
• Goal-oriented behaviors

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Learning life skills at MJC

• Registering for classes
• Seeking health care
• Starting and organizing a club
• Filing a complaint
• Finding a classroom location
• Completing and committing to an educational plan
• Meeting with a counselor

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How do we improve those skills and attitudes?

• Acknowledge that producing student learning and
  success is our primary purpose as an educational
  institution.
• Communicate the learning-centered purpose of our
  student services to our students and the public.
• Participate in an institutional culture that
  fosters the ongoing, thoughtful, and systematic
  evaluation of student learning in response to our
  services.
• Conscientiously link and organize our activities
  to support student learning and success by
  becoming learning-centered.

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Accreditation and Learning-Centered Institutions
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What is Accreditation?

• A voluntary and cyclical peer-review process in
  which we participate for the purpose of gaining
  valuable feedback about our institutional health
  and how well our students are prepared for their
  short and long term goals as a result of walking
  through our institution.

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Understanding Accreditation

• Nationwide, six regional accrediting
  associations.
• Each regional association has specific
  commissions for different segments K-12,
  Community Colleges, and Universities.
• Each regional commission establishes standards
  against which all institutions are evaluated and
  determined to be worthy of accreditation.
• Each association learns from the other
• MJC is part of WASC, Western Association of
  Schools and Colleges, the Accrediting Commission
  for Community and Junior Colleges.

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What does it mean to be accredited?

• Nationally recognized value of our courses for
  students
• State and federal funding for the college
• Financial aid for our students
• Participation in a collegial peer-review process
• Permission to self-govern and self-improve
• Academic freedom to foster an organic exchange of
  ideas
• Formal endorsement of our accomplishments
• Public trust in our institution

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How do we get to be accredited?

• We evaluate ourselves against the posted
  accreditation standards every six years.
• We write a self-study reporting what we have
  learned
• WASC selects our colleagues from other
  institutions to form our Visiting Team
• The team reads and evaluates our self-study
• They visit us and evaluate us on site

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How do we get to be accredited?

• 6) The team compares our self-study to its own
  evaluations while on site.
• 7) It determines whether we meet or exceed the
  standards.
• 8) It makes recommendations or commendations.
• 9) It renews or removes our accredited status.
• 10) The team expects us to act upon those
  recommendations during the subsequent
  accreditation period.

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About Our Accreditation

• In January 2006, MJCs accredited status was
  renewed for 6 years by WASC, with a customary
  mid-term report due in 2008. An additional
  progress report will be due in October 2007 that
  states how well we are on course in responding to
  its recent recommendations.

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The Link to SLOs
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What does SLO stand for?

• Student learning objective
• Student learning outcome
• An acronym used throughout the revised WASC
  accreditation standards in 2002.

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What does accreditation have to do with SLOs?

• WASC is the last of the agencies to incorporate
  national trends toward learning-centered
  education, principles, and processes.
• WASC has revised the standards to ensure that
  institutions put student learning first
• WASC knows that we will be on that path when we
  use Student Learning Outcomes college-wide to
  directly respond to learning.

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SLOs and MJC

• From our accreditation visit
• Federal legislation affecting accreditors
  requires that accredited colleges conduct
  systematic assessments of educational outcomes.
• Translation
• Were way behind the 8-ball!

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How do we know this?

• Observations as to how well MJC used assessment
  of student learning outcomes was the theme of
  the site visit report.
• WASC recommendations to MJC included a need to
  see student learning outcomes used at the
  institution, program/award, course, and student
  service levels.
• WASC observed that evidence (SLOs) is not used
  systematically across the college to identify
  student needs and assess progress.

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Reading between the lines

• the challenge Americas community colleges face
  with the new millennium is a need to transform
  themselves into colleges that place learning
  first in every decision and action.

William J. Flynn, Palomar CollegeThe Search for
the Learning-Centered College
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What does this mean?

• Student learning outcomes are the collective
  responsibility of the MJC community.

• Instructional and non-instructional faculty
• Student Services Personnel
• Support Staff
• Facilities personnel
• Instructional administrators

• Student services administrators
• District Personnel
• Community Members
• Board Members
• Advisory panels
• Students

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Measuring Learning
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What is a Student Learning Outcome?

• The fixed, observable, and measurable result
  after one or more events of teaching and
  learning, and/or interactions.

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Examples of Student Learning Outcomes

• 36 of new students receiving orientations in
  Spring of 2006 report they had no difficulty
  using the printed schedule of classes to schedule
  and locate classes and college resources.

(FICTITIOUS OUTCOME)
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Examples of Student Learning Outcomes

• 55 of new students who completed the FAFSA
  correctly between January 1 and March 31 of 2006,
  were given some form of financial aid.

(FICTITIOUS OUTCOME)
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Examples of Student Learning Outcomes

• 1 out of every 4 students who initially visit an
  MJC counselor return to complete an educational
  plan. 2 out of 4 of all students who prepare an
  educational plan eventually earn an associate
  degree.

(FICTITIOUS OUTCOME)
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Examples of Student Learning Outcomes

• 36 of students enrolled in MATH 90 sections who
  successfully completed MATH 70 in spring 2005
  went on to successfully complete MATH 90 in Fall
  2005.

(FICTITIOUS OUTCOME)
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Questioning an Outcome
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Outcomes produce questions

• FIRST QUESTION Why were only 20 of new students
  able to complete the registration process using
  PiratesNet?

(why does it look like this?)
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Second, third, fourth

• How many students have access to an
  Internet-accessible computer?
• How many students used Telephone Registration?
• Were there any IT failures or issues during
  registration?
• How many students completed the matriculation
  process?

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By questioning, we gain insight.

• Investigate how we can increase the number of
  phone lines during peak periods
• Increase IT resources during peak
  registration/server traffic periods.
• Make registration and institutional priority
• Increase on-line registration training of entire
  college staff (and faculty.)
• Additional student emails with on-line
  registration instructions

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Did you notice?
Outcomes cannot be linked solely to one
influencing factor.
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• Ultimately, outcomes only provide strong evidence
  as to whether certain factors working together
  produce or increase learning.

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Those factors can include

• Curriculum design
• Course activities
• Student support services
• Learning resources
• Teaching methods
• Instructional modality
• Scheduling
• Budgetary provisions
• Facilities
• Student demographics
• Learning styles
• External influences

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Every outcome can give feedback about those
factors.

• Curriculum design
• Course activities
• Student support services
• Learning resources
• Teaching methods
• Instructional modality

• Scheduling
• Budgetary provisions
• Facilities
• Student demographics
• Learning styles
• External influences

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One outcome is an intriguing glimpse at an
institutions effectiveness at a given point in
time.
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We are ALL part of each and every outcome!
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Outcomes are very complex.

• Multiple factors influence an outcome
• Factors can be internal and/or external
• Some factors we influence directly
• Some factors we influence indirectly
• Outcomes require thoughtful analysis and inquiry
• Outcomes invite questions
• Outcomes inspire solutions
• Outcomes require integrated, ongoing dialog
• Outcomes are MJCs responsibility

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Overview of Outcomes

• Not permanently fixed, nor permanently
  unchangeable
• Not usually predictable
• Not something we write
• Linked to many influencing factors
• Intriguing glimpse at MJCs effectiveness at a
  given point and time
• Generate questions and stimulate responses about
  how and how well learning occurs

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Responding to Outcomes
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Inquiring about outcomes

• Research and practice is showing that- by
  engaging in a systematic and ongoing
  investigation into the causes of learning
  outcomes- student learning and success can be
  improved by those closes to the students
  faculty, staff, and administrators.

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TLC Learning-Centered,Educator-Guided Cycle for
the Improvement of Teaching and Learning
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What is the TLC?

• The Teaching and Learning Cycle is an iterative
  process through which educators choose one or
  more events of student learning or activity to
  systematically investigate and gain insight about
  what has contributed to, detracted from, or not
  affected learning and success.

Any person whos role contributes to   student
success, either directly or indirectly
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We can all use the TLC to learn about student
learning and success.
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Flexibility of the Cycle

• The TLC should be employed in all areas of the
  college, at every level,and across all
  functions to evaluate how a student interacts
  with and benefits from our institution, as its
  sole purpose is to help us evaluate our
  effectiveness from a students experiential
  perspective.

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Strengths of the Cycle

• Regulates steps that we already use in our
  teaching and service practices to improve student
  success.
• Allows us to fairly and objectively evaluate how
  learning happens in our courses, programs, and
  institutional activities.
• Becomes more valuable with each revolution.
• Keeps us from wasting time exploring ineffective
  means of improvement
• Allows us to systematically, not only
  intuitively, review the process of teaching and
  learning and providing services to make
  meaningful decisions to improve student success.

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The cycle begins from a fixed reference point
that lasts for the duration of one or more
cycles.
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Where the Cycle Begins
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A Student Learning

• Objective is an explicit statement that clearly
  identifies the desired observable and measurable
  knowledge, skills, attitudes, and or behaviors
  that must be shown to demonstrate has taken place
  in a given context.

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What does an objective do?

• Informs the student what knowledge, skill,
  behavior, or attitude should occur in a given
  activity, assuming a satisfactory experience.
• Inspires active student involvement by
  encouraging them to be accountable and letting
  them measure their progress in comparison to the
  goal.
• Communicates our expectations explicitly and
  concisely so that all audiences are aware of the
  learning targeted in a given context.
• Establishes a goal to which we correlate specific
  teaching, learning, and/or service activities.
• Acts as a baseline against which we measure and
  compare outcomes in lessons, courses, programs,
  services, and the institution overall.

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A Student Learning

• Objective is an explicit statement that clearly
  identifies the desired observable and measurable
  knowledge, skills, attitudes, and or behaviors
  that must be shown to demonstrate has taken place
  in a given context.

Outcome is the fixed, measured result of one or
more events of teaching and learning, and/or
service in a given context.
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Student Learning Objectives (What you want.)
Student Learning Outcomes (What you get)
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Outcomes happen.
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Outcomes are not the point.
Its what we do in response to them that counts.
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STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES
Objectives
Response
Just one of many tools that advances us from
providing instruction and service to facilitating
learning and success.
Dialog
Inquiry
Collaboration
Assessment
Evaluation
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Thanks to the 2005-2006MJC SLO Committee

• Adrienne Peek, English
• Anne Shanto, Theatre
• Becky Plaza, Outreach
• Charles Mullins, Speech Communication
• Ed Howard, English
• Gerald Wray, Autobody
• Kathleen Silva, Research and Planning
• Lee Merchant, Psychology

Letitia Senechal, SLO Facilitator Melissa Beach,
Instructional Services Michele Monlux,
Science Mike Morales, Agriculture Noel Langley,
Admissions and Records Penny Belus, Magic
Lab Shelley Circle, English
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