SACSCOC Fifth Year Interim Report
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Assessment : 2011 - 2012 : Educational Programs :
Criminal Justice BA
Criminal Justice BA
2 Goals 2 Objectives 2 Indicators 2 Criteria 2 Findings 2 Actions
| GOAL: Specific Knowledge Acquired By All Undergraduates |
| Objective |
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Graduating seniors will exhibit comprehensive knowledge of core criminal justice course work. |
| Indicator |
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Each semester, all graduating seniors are asked to complete an exit exam, on the SHSU Blackboard academic support system, that provides faculty a means of assessing students' comprehension and retention on key concepts provided to them during their educational experience. The 60-item Exit Exam, created by faculty, assesses learning in seven core areas. |
| Criterion |
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The average on each competency area: (1) Criminal Law; (2) Corrections; (3) Law Enforcement; (4) Courts; (5) Theory/Criminology (6) Research Methods/Statistics, and (7) Diversity within the Criminal Justice System will be at least 70% for graduating seniors taking the exit exam at the end of their capstone course. We will be paying special attention on the Criminology/Theory score as this was low for our first administration in 2010-2011. |
| Finding |
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Graduating seniors achieved an average of 77% on the overall exit exam and between 66% and 89% on the component areas representing the undergraduate curriculum. Senior exit exam scores for the 2011-2012 academic year indicated that students had the following averages across the six core competency areas: Criminal Law - 84% Corrections - 89% Policing and Law Enforcement - 72% Courts - 74% Criminology/Theory - 66 % Research Methods/Statistics - 74% Crime, Justice, and Social Diversity - 77% Results indicated that the graduating seniors scored above 70% on all competency areas except for Criminology/Theory. |
Actions for Objective:
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This was our second administration of the senior exit exam that represents our newly developed undergraduate curriculum. We will collect this exam data through 2012-2013 to obtain a higher N before we make changes to the exam or coursework. We will be watching each competency score carefully, with special attention on the Criminology/Theory score as this was low for our first two administrations. |
| GOAL: Development Of Writing And Research Skills |
| Objective |
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| Students will demonstrate competence in their writing and research skills. |
| Indicator |
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Undergraduate criminal justice students will develop a scholarly research paper proposal in their core required Research Methods course (CRIJ 3378). Writing and research skills will be scored by a rubric agreed upon by a faculty committee. Each professor will utilize this rubric when grading the student research paper proposals. These guidelines include areas of organization, content, quality of proposed research, hypothesis construction and writing. |
| Criterion |
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| The majority of students will score at 75% or above on the research paper proposal scoring rubric. |
| Finding |
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The students who were assessed by the scoring rubric met the criterion of scoring an overall average of 75%. However, most sections of the Research Methods course (CRIJ 3378) did not utilize the rubric. |
Actions for Objective:
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Increase the quality and quantity of the writing and research skills of our undergraduates. We will also meet with the Research Methods instructors to discuss and ensure the use of the developed scoring rubric for the ongoing assessment of our students' writing and research skills. |
| Closing the Loop |
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Moving forward into the 2012-2013 academic year we will assess and improve our undergraduate programs. During the last academic year we began implementing our updated and approved BA and BS programs. The goals for the BA/BS for the 2012-2013 academic year will include these latest objectives.
During the academic year of 2011-2012 we exceeded our goal of having our graduating seniors score at the 70th (or higher) percentile on all exit exam component areas except one. The overall score was 77%. Thus, overall our new curriculum seems to be increasing our students’ knowledge. Additionally, in the majority of the component areas, our students scored very high. As in the previous years, our students scored below expectations on the area of Criminology/Theory. We will monitor the scores in the component areas for possible deficiencies or warranted changes in our courses. During the 2012-2013 academic year we will embolden and support our undergraduates in their efforts to develop their research and writing skills by encouraging and supporting their attendance at local, regional, and national conferences. Additionally, we will meet with all Research Methods instructors to ensure the assessment rubric’s application in order to obtain a larger assessment of our students’ writing and research proposal skills. |