Leadership Exchange - Spring 2008

By Nancy Grund

The University of Central Florida (UCF) spent two years preparing for its most recent re-accreditation in December 2006. From the onset of the process, the Division of Student Development and Enrollment Services (SDES) was an integral part of the leadership team, which included all vice presidents and key management on campus.

SDES staff members were leaders in responding to a number of issues related to accreditation, including student and academic support services, academic policies and procedures, student rights and responsibilities, and staff qualifications. Not only were they responsible for gathering information, they assisted in writing and editing sections of the re-accreditation report.

A new component of the accreditation process is the Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). The development of a QEP guides a college or university in enhancing its overall institutional quality and effectiveness by focusing on an issue or issues that the administration considers critical to student learning. The university’s QEP, What If? A Foundation for Information Fluency, was an effort to establish a foundation for information fluency at UCF. The selection of information fluency as the university’s QEP gives UCF the opportunity to design curricular and co-curricular pilot programs to expand students’ abilities to gather, evaluate, and use information. Student learning outcomes adopted from the Association of College and Research Libraries’ information literacy standards serve as the foundation for the plan’s assessment process. The plan covers such areas as career services, financial literacy, academic integrity, navigating academic success, and the Student Academic Resource Center

Throughout the re-accreditation process, staffing was a priority. For those student affairs staff members chosen as part

professionals within the institution. Collaborative assessment planning and implementation will not occur overnight. Discussions must begin between the campus silos, and co-curricular and curricular departments must work together. This collaboration often begins in small ways, such as examining how an institution’s general education outcomes align with some of the programs, events, or learning opportunities provided by student affairs.

^MYTH ^6:Once a report is compiled for accreditation purposes, the job of student affairs is complete. Wrong! Assessment is an ongoing process. It never ends. Students are always changing—from Xers, to Yers, and now millennials. They learn differently, express themselves differently, and demonstrate what they have learned differently. Student affairs assessment—the purpose of which is to enhance the student learning experience—is never complete. Compiling a report for accreditation purposes is important, but of greater importance is sharing assessment results with the campus community and using those results to enhance the student

of the team, their re-accreditation responsibilities became number one priorities. And there was a general understanding that the division’s director of assessment and planning would spend more time on re-accreditation and less time on routine assessment activities.

Senior student affairs officers must realize that if student affairs comes to the table as an active participant in re-accreditation and is recognized for that participation, it fosters continued involvement of student affairs in all campus functions. “We need to be in the forefront of student learning and development and demonstrate how it can be done and be done well through assessment,” says Maribeth Ehasz, UCF vice president for student development and enrollment services. “What we do is learning as much as anything else. We have found assessment to be an important and integral part of our role. Student affairs colleagues need to invest time, energy, and person power to be involved in the process.”

As evidence of the SDES contributions to the re-accreditation process, the dean of the newly created UCF medical school invited Ehasz and other SDES members to be part of her team and assist in preparing for the accreditation of the new medical college.

Members of the SDES team are now working through the university’s QEP status report and the five-year strategic plan to review its assessment results for their student and academic support services and identify opportunities for improvement. For more information, see www.if.ucf.edu/qep

Nancy Grund is managing editor of Leadership Exchange.

experience and to communicate to students who participate in student affairs assessments.

Abandon All Assumptions

Assessment of student learning is not a fad. Building and sustaining a culture of assessment requires individuals to abandon any assumptions they bring to the table and to use accreditation requirements as a carrot, not a stick. SSAOs have the opportunity to equip themselves with evidence of how their divisions contribute to student learning, virtually guaranteeing them seats at the table with other campus decisionmakers. If SSAOs ignore this opportunity, they will be brought to the table and told how to assess student learning, which may not be in the best interest of students. Student affairs professionals know students and have the opportunity to demonstrate the value they provide to the students’ overall educational experiences. Do not miss this opportunity.