SACSCOC Fifth Year Interim Report
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Assessment : 2012 - 2013 : Educational Programs :
Political Science BA/BS
Political Science BA/BS
2 Goals 2 Objectives 2 Indicators 2 Criteria 2 Findings 2 Actions
| GOAL: Develop Students' Knowledge Of Government And Politics |
| Objective |
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| Throughout their enrollment, students will explore the following themes in a national and international context: the structure and operation of various forms of government, political philosophies, informal and formal political organizations and actors, public policies, and political behavior |
| Indicator |
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Each field of study will be assigned a team of 2 faculty members who have expertise in the particular field. Each semester the individual teams will receive and review 5 randomly selected papers from an upper division course in their respective fields. Faculty members from each subfield will evaluate the papers using the revised grading rubric for 2012-2013. The papers will be scored on a scale of 1-5 with 5 being the highest. |
| Criterion |
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We expect that: (1) Students will demonstrate the ability to conduct a literature review utilizing at least 5 resources. (2) Students will complete a plagiarism tutorial. (3) At least 70% of literature reviews will score a 3 or above. (4) At least 70% or students will complete the plagiarism tutorial. |
| Finding |
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Using a scoring system of 1-5 to evaluate 5 random papers in our upper division offerings, faculty members evaluated 100 papers submitted by students during the fall 2012 and spring 2013 semesters. Faculty scores differed in 37 of the 100 (37%), however, the difference in scores only exceeded a single point on the 5 point rubric in one instance. The average score was 4.25 which was an improvement over the previous year's assessment of 4.09. The departments efforts to identify areas to focus in 2009-2010 have been fruitful as scores have consistently increased over the last 3 years. We exceeded our goal of over 70% scoring a 70% or higher. The department was unsuccesful in implementing a standard assignment which included a literature review thus, there is no data on this objective. Individual faculty provided instruction on plagiarism during both semesters, however, the department faculty found a need for further student instruction regarding plagiarism. |
Actions for Objective:
| Action |
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| Given the high scores on the current asssessment, the faculty will revise the rubric for 2013-2014 by creating a two separate rubrics: one for writing style to including the assessment of student's ability to conduct a literature review; the second one solely on the content and student's ability to present an argument. |
| GOAL: Develop Students' Skills |
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All political science majors are required to successfully complete POLS 3379. Upon completing the course students will be able to analyze scholarly writing, interpret empirical data, discuss argumentation, and write clearly and correctly. |
| Indicator |
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Faculty members teaching POLS 3379 Research and Writing will randomly select 5 papers from each course. All papers will be reviewed by the faculty members who teaching Research and Writing. |
| Criterion |
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| At least 70% of students will score a "3" (acceptable) or better. |
| Finding |
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A panel of faculty who routinely teach POLS 3379 used a scoring system of 1 - 5 to perform a blind evaluation of 5 randomly selected papers from each section of POLS 3379. The resulting sample was 20 papers. Faculty scores differed in 11 out of the 20 papers sampled or in 55% of the papers. However, the difference in scores never exceeded a single point. The average score was 3.43 which was lower that the 3.8 average from last year. The results also indicate that 70% of the papers scored a 3 (acceptable) or higher, just meeting our goal. Although the findings indicate that we me our expectations for this particular goal, faculty teaching POLS 3379 courses believe students would benefit in the long run if faculty discussed ways to make the course content more consistent across all sections of POLS 3379 regardless of who is teaching the course. In addition, the faculty found that the department needs to measure research skills separately from writing skills. |
Actions for Objective:
| Action |
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| The rubric will be revised to focus on research related skills including assessing and analyzing resource documents, conducting a literature review, and analyzing data. The faculty teaching POLS 3379 will meet to make sections of POLS consistent. |
| Previous Cycle's "Plan for Continuous Improvement" |
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In order to address students’ writing, faculty responsible for teaching POLS 3379 will develop a syllabus template for the course to be adopted in spring 2013 that emphasizes instruction in writing. In addition, the faculty agreed to revise the assessment rubrics for 2012-2013 to focus more on the content of the assignments and devise alternative writing assignments that focus on this content rather than grammar and formatting. The department will identify and implement a plagiarism tutorial for both POLS 3379 courses and all other upper division courses.
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| Update on Previous Cycle's "Plan for Continuous Improvement" |
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The faculty that teach POLS 3379 placed a greater emphasis on writing skills in 2012-2013, but found that further course development in this area is needed. The faculty struggle with student deficiencies in basic grammer and formatting skills to the extent that it makes it difficult to adequately assess the substantive content. While each professor that teaches POLS 3379 addressed plagariasm as part of the course curriculum, the department failed to implement a plagiarism tutorial as planned. The lack of techinical expertise in loading such a tutorial is the biggest impediment.
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| Plan for Continuous Improvement |
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The department will focus on revising the assessment rubrics:
1. POLS 3379 will focus on research skills and writing skills separately 2. Upper division courses will focus on substantive content and writing skills separately. 3. Upper division courses will have different rubrics based on subfields (i.e., theory, International Relations/Comparative Politics, American politics). |