Category: Assessment

You can learn about assessment and grading in this section.

Comments on student papers come in many different forms. While ISUComm Foundation Courses requires all instructors to provide marginal and terminal comments–as well as a completed rubric–for all major assignments, we encourage you to develop your own, unique commenting style that aligns with your classroom practices. Keep in mind that commenting on individual projects is … Continue reading Commenting on Student Projects

Written Composing Assessment Overview Holistic: Does the writing genuinely and productively engage the audience? Students whose written compositions fall into the upper half (4–6: competent, mature, exemplary) present a thoughtful thesis, supported by specific examples and details, and a distinct voice suited to the audience and purpose. Their work is more often deductively structured and … Continue reading ISUComm Assessment Guidelines by Mode

ISUComm continually revises its assessment plan as its program evolves. Sometimes sections are selected randomly for collecting specific student artifacts (a special activity, a survey, a routine assignment, a communication portfolio). ISUComm also collaborates with other universities, especially within the Big Twelve, on program assessment. Periodically, we interview individual students or form focus groups of … Continue reading Your Role in Program Assessment

To discover what happens with written, oral, visual, and electronic communication during the sophomore academic year, 223 sophomore students from various disciplines in the university participated in an online survey in Spring 2005. One key finding from this survey was that “most communication areas have been significantly overlooked in the sophomore curriculum.” In general, the … Continue reading Spring 2005 Sophomore Survey

ISUComm is committed to multiple forms of program assessment. When the ISUComm program was piloted in 2004, its pedagogy was carefully researched to ensure its effectiveness. As part of that pilot study, we compared student performance in the ISUComm pilot courses with students performance in other sections of English 250 at the time. After analyzing … Continue reading ISUComm Pilot Study

Instructors and programs, just like students, should continually assess themselves in order to grow and improve. Instructors use a midterm assessment to gather feedback from students while there is still an opportunity to make changes in a course. All instructors use a standard course evaluation form at the end of the term. Both the qualitative … Continue reading Assessing Program Performance

Plagiarism is an increasingly severe problem in ISUComm Foundation Courses. Students can now easily access student essays on the web and can purchase papers (of A, B, or C quality) on hundreds of topics. While curbing plagiarism should not be a major criterion when creating assignments, it is something to keep in mind. Steps that … Continue reading Academic Dishonesty

All faculty and staff who work with student records should be familiar with Iowa State’s policy concerning confidentiality of student information. This policy was established to preserve students’ rights to privacy and to conform with federal law (See the section on “Student Records” in the Iowa State University Catalog). The policy defines “public information” as … Continue reading Confidentiality of Student Records

The University requirement of C or better in English 250 went in to effect Fall 2018 (2018-2019 ISU Catalog). ISUComm is an all-university requirement. However, sometimes students or their advisers misunderstand the difference between the university-wide ISUComm Foundation Courses credit requirement (English 150 and 250) and the upper-level communication proficiency requirement specified by each major. Knowing … Continue reading Communication Proficiency Requirement