NSU's Quality Enhancement Plan April 2017

NSU QEP Assessment Plan | 33 and facilitators will be informed of the results so they can make improvements where necessary. In addition, faculty members will be asked to voluntarily provide students’ written artifacts from the course they taught prior to the workshops, as well as students’ written artifacts from the same course taught after participation in the workshop. This will enable pre- and postassessments of the faculty member feedback on students’ writing through a cross-sectional research design. Indirect Assessment of Student Outcomes In addition to the direct assessment strategies listed above, a set of indirect assessments will be employed to provide insights into the overall success of the QEP. NSU’s overarching goal is for the QEP to serve as a catalyst of change for the development of permanent structures and processes aimed at creating a campus environment that puts writing proficiency in the forefront of student learning. While this goal is lofty and somewhat difficult to measure, the QEP Assessment Team will collect and analyze data through several indirect assessments. These indirect assessments will allow the university to gain perspective on the cultural shifts that may be occurring as a result of the successful implementation of the QEP. National Survey of Student Engagement NSU has been administering the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) in the winter semester every third year since 2004. The data collected by the NSSE survey include students’ self-reports of quantity and frequency of engagement in educational practices associated with high levels of learning and development. For the purposes of the QEP, the assessment team will focus on the NSSE questions from the “Experiences with Writing” module. According to NSSE, “This module is the result of an ongoing collaboration between NSSE and the Council of Writing Program Administrators. The questions touch on three aspects of good writing assignments—interactivity, meaning-making, and clarity. It complements questions on the core survey about how much writing students do, the nature of their course assignments, and perceived gains in written expression,” (NSSE, 2016). NSSE data are collected by the Office of Institutional Effectiveness and disseminated to the university community. The QEP Assessment Team will review the data over time to ascertain changes in students’ responses from the “Experiences with Writing” module after QEP implementation. The assessment team will also use national NSSE data to compare NSU’s student responses to the national norms regarding the extent to which student engagement with writing has changed over time. The Faculty Survey of Student Engagement (FSSE) NSU has been administering the Faculty Survey of Student Engagement (FSSE) in the winter semester every third year since 2004. The FSSE instrument will be administered to faculty members as an indirect measurement of students’ critical thinking skills. In addition to examining changes in the overall FSSE scores, particular attention will be paid to the results of the “Experiences with Writing” (EW) module. The EW module is designed to assess three aspects of good writing assessments: interactivity, meaning-making, and clarity. The QEP Assessment Team will review the data over time to ascertain changes in faculty member responses from the EW module after QEP implementation. The assessment team will also use national FSSE data to compare NSU’s student responses to the national norms regarding the extent to which student engagement with writing has changed over time.