Project Description #3

Outcome Assessment Support System

Context:

The undergraduate assessment structure is in place to meet requirements set forth by ABET. Each
outcome is assessed in one or more courses.

CIS faculty members established outcomes, assessments and rubrics to be used to evaluate student
responses on the assessments. Assessment results are tabulated and compared to predefined
baselines indicating whether satisfactory and possibly exemplary student performance levels were
met. Results from one or more assessments associated with an outcome are considered as faculty
members decide whether changes to the CIS program are necessary to address student
performance shortcomings. Currently, this process is largely paper-based and relies upon a single
user spreadsheet. Data is not easily shared and the progress of evaluating assessments can not be
determined.

The purpose of the system is to capture, maintain and display student outcomes, assessment results
and stated responses to facilitate the assessment feedback loop.

General Requirements:

There will be two levels of users: Administrator, Faculty

The Administrator will

1. provide credentials to access the system

2. edit his/her own credentials
3. create and edit faculty accounts
4. enter and edit the ABET objectives and identifiers
5. enter and edit the CIS objectives and identifiers. Link the CIS objectives to ABET objectives.
6. enter and edit the course and semester(s) where each outcome is assessed.
7. identify and edit the faculty member responsible for conducting each assessment
8. for each assessment rubric, specify a description of the assessment, number of characteristics
to be evaluated and the name of each characteristic. There may be as many as seven
characteristics. Allow a characteristic to be added which represents meeting the satisfactory
level on all characteristics for this assessment. (See attached example rubric).
9. for each characteristic on an assessment rubric, specify the number of levels and the name
associated with each level. Level numbers range from one to three, four or five.
10. for each rubric, specify the level and the percentage of responses necessary to meet the
satisfactory goal.
11. for each rubric, specify the level and the percentage of responses necessary to meet the
exemplary goal, if used.
12. obtain a list of assessments by semester which reflects progress by faculty - who is assigned
to what assessments and whether data entry has been completed
13. once all assessment data has been entered for an outcome, retrieve and display the results of
all associated assessments (satisfactory level baseline and actual results - color coded
reflecting success or lack thereof - see top of Outcome Assessment Review form). The
system should then capture responses to the questions found on the bottom half of the
Outcome Assessment Review form indicating whether changes are needed to course content

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 and/or the program. Action items should capture the faculty member responsible and the
action to be taken, as appropriate. If the change is not specific to a single faculty member,
all faculty should be used. Ideally, the assessment results and the data entry fields for the
Assessment Review questions should appear on a single screen without scrolling. For each
assessment result there should be a link to to display the answers to the Review questions
from the Assessment Administration Review form and associated comments.

The Faculty Member will

14. provide credentials to access the system.

15. edit account data (credentials, UCM email address)
16. select an assessment by outcome, semester, course and whether it is for individuals or
groups, then enter results from the rubric for each student/group. Individual rubric are
cataloged by a control number (1,2,3 etc). Once data from all rubrics have been entered, the
results should be tabulated and displayed. Responses to the Review Questions (see the
lower half of the attached Assessment Administration Review) should be captured. Also,
additional comments should be captured. All of this data should be editable. The system
should also capture the date and the identity of the individual entering the data.
17. be able to review the results of the Outcome Assessment Review (read only) for each.
18. pull a list of action items by course for which he/she is responsible. This will include all
faculty as well.

Technical Requirements:

19. The system must be web-based. Client access will be through a browser.
20. Communication and storage of credentials should be properly secured. Passwords should be
salted and stored with a cryptographic hash function. Guard against HTML and SQL
injections. Validate input at data entry using JavaScript and before storing.
21. Make efficient use of server resources. Minimize database connections and session variables

Another Description of Requirements:

The system should capture and make editable

The ABET-specified student objectives

The CIS student objectives
The relationship between the CIS and ABET objectives
The outcome being assessed
The course(s) in which the assessment will be conducted
The semester(s) in which the assessment is to occur
For each assessment tool
The CIS objective addressed
The rubric being used
Number of levels
Name of each level
Number of characteristics
Description of characteristic by level
The baseline level of expected performance
Certain percentage of students
Will attain a certain level or above

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 An exceptional level of expected performance (optional)
Certain percentage of students
Will attain a certain level or above

For each assessment instance

The course
The date (term)
The assigned responsible instructor
For each characteristic
The number of students attaining each level
Capture an identifying number and the score for each student on each characteristic
and calculate the totals from these stored scores - this will need to have an easy
to use, fast, interface

The system should generate

For each outcome by term

For each associated assessment
The total students at each level by characteristic
The baseline and exceptional levels of performance
Actual levels of performance
An indicator of whether the level was attained

The system should also capture and display

For each academic year

The stated analysis of the outcome results
The stated action statements to be implemented
Assigned responsibility for the actions

Additional requirements
Log all modifications to Outcomes, Assessments with date and stated justification
Generate a report sorted by instructor for assigned assessments and whether the data
has been entered

All requirements are subject to change.

Notes:

1. The Administrator may also be a faculty member

2. User experience is important. Task completion should be efficient, intuitive and easy to learn.
Provide appropriate and adequate help and feedback. The site should be attractive. Pages
should be consistent in format, color, fonts, etc. Select an appropriate name for the site.
Populate drop downs for fields like faculty member, grade, etc.

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