Although many psychology departments and instructors are aware of the American Psychological Association Guidelines for the Undergraduate Psychology Major Version 2.0, they are often less aware of the means by which to assess student mastery of the recommended goals. Our purpose is to discuss general principles for assessment, offer a psychology learner taxonomy that aligns with Goal 1 of the Guidelines 2.0, and present a rubric for reviewing assessments. Goal 1 of the Guidelines 2.0 is based on content knowledge in psychology. Whereas most assessments allow for the measure of the mastery of content to different extents, the results of those assessments can be invalid due to the design or inappropriate use of the rubric. The working group at the Summit on National Assessment of Psychology addressed these issues and curated evidence-informed assessment exemplars designed to measure content knowledge in psychology.
This chapter describes an outcomes assessment study completed in a basic composition course at a small urban open admissions community college. The course was a pilot course designed in response to marginally remedial performance on a standardized writing instrument and solidly exempted performance on the standardized reading instrument. This chapter takes its readers from process to product, exploring both the collaboration between administration and faculty as well as the steps involved in assessing student learning. Specifically discussed is how data was used to guide decision making about curricular change on our campus. At different moments, this assessment study highlights a success story, red flags areas of weakness and suggests future courses of action and research.
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