by Dr. Kevin Ahlgrim & Dr. Joan Brehm
Dr. Ahlgrim, Chair, Finance, Insurance and Law
The reason I participated in this session is to help advance progress by the Department of Finance, Insurance and Law (FIL) in assessing its curriculum due to additional business school accreditation requirements. In addition to Illinois State University’s (ISU’s) accreditation by the Higher Learning Commission, the College of Business (COB) at ISU is also accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB). The AACSB is the most widely recognized accreditation of business schools and considered the “gold standard” internationally. Of the approximately 10,000 business schools globally, ISU is one of less than 200 that are accredited in both business and accounting, putting us in an elite group of schools.
There are several criteria that are reviewed during the re-accreditation process for business schools including mission appropriateness, faculty qualifications, and continuous improvement (among others). As part of continuous improvement, schools of business are expected to develop explicit plans for establishing specific learning competencies for their programs as well as a systematic assurance of learning (AoL) process to demonstrate the achievement of specific learning competencies. The COB revamped its AoL process during the last reaccreditation cycle in 2021-22. To help provide more insight into the AoL process, I registered for the HLC “Program Assessment Workshop.”
For me, the main takeaways from the workshop reinforced the specific steps involved in the AoL process, but also highlighted specific challenges, especially getting the necessary buy-in from all parties. While assessment is necessary for AACSB accreditation, it may feel like a burden to faculty if it is just a compliance issue rather than a tool to ensure student learning and improve the overall curriculum. When faculty are focused on their specific courses, they may lose sight of the bigger picture focusing on the overall academic program. With a deliberate, methodical AoL process, we gain the confidence that not only are students actually learning in our specific courses, but the process of determining learning objectives for the program also indicates that students are learning the most relevant information. This can then bleed its way into more than one of the required courses in the overall program.
From participating in the workshop, a second takeaway was related to understanding the structure of the curriculum and its impact on learning objectives. At the time of the workshop, we were having internal discussions about creating formal sequences in the finance major to illustrate the different career paths that are common for finance graduates. The creation of different sequences would alter the structure of the curriculum from one that is currently more flexible for students (choose from a menu of electives) versus a curriculum that would be more rigid. The impact of adding “new” required courses in a sequence helps get buy-in from faculty who see how the content from one course impacts learning objectives for the program and the related AoL process. With the ongoing review of the University’s strategic plan, the conversation has even turned toward incorporating broader strategies into the learning objectives of the major.
Dr. Brehm, Chair, Sociology & Anthropology
After participating in the HLC Assessment Workshop – Develop Skills for Meaningful Assessment, I wanted to share some thoughts on what I found to be the most impactful and meaningful take-aways.
This workshop helped to shift my view of assessment from one that viewed this as just another task or report that needed to be filed by a certain deadline, to a perspective that now sees assessment is an opportunity to tell the story of the great things we are doing and how to use this data and evidence to get the resources that we need to continue our work.
I also found the focus on student learning and outcomes to be a helpful framework, emphasizing how we can help our students to be successful with the skills we want them to have. When we focus on our learning outcomes, we can more clearly see our academic responsibility to help students meet these, while at the same time embracing the freedom to get them there in ways that work for our department. As an academic program we must own these outcomes, but we have the freedom to determine how we help our students to get to those outcomes in the most meaningful and impactful way. With academic freedom comes academic responsibility. Overall, this workshop helped me to re-frame my own perspectives on assessment and this will help me to lead these efforts within our department in a more meaningful and engaging manner.