Post-Secondary Measurements of Growth

Nearly 70 two- and four-year colleges will test a project to assess student growth in skills including quantitative reasoning, written communication and critical thinking by using common rubrics to evaluate student work across states and institutions.
The Multi-State Collaborative to Advance Learning Outcomes Assessment  is a joint project of the Association of American Colleges and Universities and the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association, and part of an ongoing learning assessment initiative by AAC&U. In addition to building faculty assessment capacity, the project will develop an online data platform for uploading student work samples and assessment data.
The project’s first year is funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
“The calls are mounting daily for higher education to be able to show what students can successfully do with their learning,” AAC&U President Carol Geary Schneider said in a statement. “The Multi-State Collaborative is a very important step toward focusing assessment on the best evidence of all: the work students produce in the course of their college studies. It is exciting and inspiring to see that so many campuses want to be part of this important national study and change effort.”