Dive Brief:
- A total of 68 two- and four-year colleges in nine states are joining up for a student learning assessment project sponsored by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
- The project will test a cross-institutional assessment of key learning outcomes in student work, including quantitative reasoning, written communication, and critical thinking.
- In its first year, the project will build faculty assessment capacity and collect student work products, as well as develop an Internet platform to upload student work samples and assessment data.
Dive Insight:
The project, called the Multi-State Collaborative to Advance Learning Outcomes Assessment, was announced by the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association. The project is part of the ongoing VALUE (Valid Assessment of Learning in Undergraduate Education) initiative, which has already developed rubrics used by more than 2,000 U.S. colleges to assess student work. The nine states with participating colleges in the project are Connecticut, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Utah.
