Part 3

V. SUPPORT

A. Student Services

The support provided by the Student Services professional staff is critical to the success of many students. Research by Astin and other work by Terrenzini and Pascarella supports our common observation that much of the college experience takes place outside of the classroom. Student services reach out to those aspects of student life, and contribute to personal development. In addition, services provided through Student Health and the Counseling Center give valuable sup- port during periods of personal crisis. Student services programs help students get the full benefit of the residen- tial educational experience that the University of Oregon offers, and assist them in reaching their full potential. By doing so, these services strongly support the primary goals of this Productivity Plan.

B. Library Services

The University Library will be expected to play a number of key roles in the implementation of this plan. Even such purely departmental decisions as increasing Summer Session offerings will require concomitant Library support. Independent study projects for students place added demands on library staff and facilities, as do participatory learning research projects. The Library is also in a natural position to support and encourage group learning. In the area of technology, Library staff members already have experience with video recording and transmission and with electronic information transfer. The University will take advantage of their expertise, both to develop courses for delivery on campus and for distance learning.

C. Academic Support

1. Supplies, Services and Support Staff

One of the underlying strategies in this Productivity Plan is to get the greatest possible value from our faculty members, by using their time wisely and by providing them with the tools they need to teach effectively. To ask faculty to do more support chores or to go without basic supplies and equipment for office, lab or studio defeats this strategy. The recent University review of academic support, in connection with the Board Administrative Review Committee, has helped to evaluate the present level of support and to point out how further cuts would affect overall productivity.

2. Student Records

Several departments have pointed out that in order to carry out their productivity recommendations it will be necessary to add to the functions presently available on the Banner student record database.

VI. ACADEMIC STANDARDS

The issue of maintaining uniform academic standards is particularly important for programs in which learning takes place out of direct contact or supervision by faculty. This plan's emphasis on increased student responsibility for learning, as well as our proposals for distance learning, internships and credit by examination, require the University to reexamine its policies and practices for awarding credit and grades for work done outside the classroom. The University's Academic Standards Committee proposes developing a policy statement to apply to new and on-going programs. Policies on standards for academic work conducted outside the classroom could:

•  o Require direct supervision and assignment of grade by a teaching faculty member of record.
•  o Require a significant degree of academic content.
•  o Require submission and approval of a description of the academic content for which credit is to be given, including the method of assessment.
•  o Require a uniform numbering system for such courses.
•  o Limit the number of credit hours in such courses that may be applied toward degrees.
•  o Create appropriate prerequisites or thresholds for enrollment in such courses.
•  o Require that scheduling for such courses not conflict with students' regularly scheduled classes.
•  o Clearly distinguish between various levels of faculty supervision for courses.

Reinforcing a theme brought out by the Technology working group, the Academic Standards Committee also stresses the importance of guaranteeing students equal access to technol- ogy in courses for which course work is required or permitted to be completed through computer interaction. Physical access is not enough; students must have the opportunity to become proficient in the use of the technology, outside the context of the course itself.

Improvements in information access have also increased the potential for cheating, plagiarism and alteration of records. The University must develop strategies for dealing with such security issues before they become serious problems.

VII. FACULTY ISSUES

A. Reward Structure

The University has appointed a Commission on Promotion, Tenure and Career Development, whose charge includes examin- ing the faculty reward structure and investigating mechanisms for recognizing excellence in teaching as well as in research and service. The Commission is preparing a report, which will be made available when it is completed.

Research universities around the country are observing career patterns in which faculty members wish to concentrate their efforts, for a period of time, on instruction. To take full advantage of such opportunities, institutional policies must be flexible enough to encourage faculty shifts in activities and must provide suitable rewards for performance. Some of the initiatives in this Productivity Plan will require faculty members to devote themselves for extended periods to new ways of teaching or to development of new materials and technology. The University's faculty reward structure must have clear policies that encourage such time commitments.

B. Cultural Changes

The Progress Report discusses at some length some of the shifts in faculty and student culture that will accompany the implementation of this Productivity Plan. The increased em- phasis on student responsibility for learning will require overcoming well-entrenched student and faculty expectations. This problem should ease in a few years, however, once incom- ing Oregon students are exposed to similar expectations in K- 12.

VIII. CAUTIONARY NOTES

A. Distance Learning

1. Standards

As noted above, distance learning presents special problems of monitoring and verifying student work. Any changes in degree requirements to accommodate distance learners must be carefully thought through, to be sure that standards are maintained under circumstances in which close faculty super- vision is not possible.

2. Student Communities and the Oregon Model

One of the University's main attractions to students, in addition to the strengths of its academic programs, has been its college atmosphere. The Oregon Model, arrived at as the result of the University's strategic planning process, builds on and reinforces a sense of community as a part of the student academic experience. This Productivity Plan, too, recognizes the educational importance of learning communities. Although it may be possible to arrange for distance learners to work together sometimes, they will necessarily miss out on the intellectual stimulation avail- able on campus and the support provided by student services. Distance learning should be seen as a possible option for the place-bound, providing a different educational experience from that gained on a residential campus.

3. Delivery Costs

Other things being equal, it is more economical to deliver a course in a classroom than it is to transmit it with technology. Distance learning offers an advantage in situa- tions in which courses would not otherwise be available, or in which technology permits adding students to classes that are already being taught, at relatively low marginal cost per additional student. We must be careful not to allow the already substandard State support of teaching on campus be diverted to subsidize distance learning students.

B. Technology

The Progress Report section on Technology and the report of the Technology Applications and Facilities working group call attention to a number of concerns, including not only costs but problems of maintenance and obsolescence. The University is committed to developing instructional technology and to using it effectively. Our fundamental principle is that technology must promote, enrich and upgrade the educational experience--the goal is academic quality.

IX. ASSESSMENT AND PRODUCTIVITY MEASUREMENT

The University of Oregon serves many audiences in many ways. It is impossible to reduce all the multiple facets of such a diverse institution into a handful of summary statistics that still reflect its distinctive missions, autonomy, and local culture.

The account that follows compares assessment with productiv- ity measurement, describes our vision of the "University of Oregon Portfolio" as our preferred approach for accountabil- ity to our multiple audiences, describes competing pressures in achieving the coordinated effort required for such a portfolio, and discusses how the portfolio can be packaged to meet the primary and operational goals of the productivity planning process.

A. The Comparison Between Assessment and Productivity Measurement

Assessment and productivity measurement are separate, although related, concepts. Assessment answers questions such as, "How well are we doing? What impact is our organization having on our clients? How well are we achieving our organi- zational goals?" Higher education engages in constant assessment:

Student learning and progress is assessed by exams, assignments, and studio and performance evaluations;

Faculty quality is assessed through the annual evaluations, the promotion and tenure process, and regularized post-tenure reviews; and

Departmental quality is assessed directly through periodic program reviews and by national professional organizations, and indirectly by the success of its graduates in a variety of contexts.

Moreover, assessment processes are under constant revision and review: assignments and tests are constantly revised, teaching methods change, and promotion criteria revised.

Productivity measurement introduces the notion of quantity produced (of a given quality) per unit of input. It answers questions such as, "How effectively and efficiently, per dollar or per unit time, are we achieving our goals?" Productivity measurement is problematic in higher education, where what to measure may be debated and the interpretation of the result is not straightforward. Is an increase in students per faculty an improvement in productivity, in that more people are being educated per faculty salary dollar input, or is it a decrease in productivity in that there are fewer faculty contact hours per individual student?

Although an industrial, input-output metaphor is inappropri- ate to the University's missions and history--mere production is not productivity--we recognize that greater accountability to our multiple audiences is necessary, appropriate, and timely.

The proposal we describe below blends elements of both assessment and productivity measurement. It may be used to satisfy external demands for accountability, but it is also designed to be used for internal goal-setting, decision- making, and evaluation.

B. The University of Oregon Portfolio

The best periodic assessment and productivity report, we believe, would take the form of a portfolio. The "University of Oregon Portfolio" would be issued annually and would contain multiple measures of the University's achievements, including:

•  o Tables and graphs, depicting numerous measures of activities related to the University's missions;
•  o Vignettes of faculty members in teaching and research;
•  o Photo essays of individual students and living groups;
•  o Video- and audio-tapes of dance, drama and musical performances;
• o Sketches of labs, institutes and departments; and
•  o Samples of University members' consultation in business, industry, and government.

The University of Oregon Portfolio must reflect the objec- tives of higher education generally and the University's accomplishment of those objectives specifically. Higher education's objectives may be condensed as:

1. The discovery and creation of new knowledge;

2. The application of knowledge in undergraduate and graduate education; and

3. The application of knowledge in service to society.

Indicators of all three objectives will be included in each annual portfolio. More complete descriptions of these objectives are described in Appendix C, where they are followed by examples of possible appropriate measures that could be employed in the portfolio.

C. Competing Pressures

Some data items that would be appropriate for the University of Oregon Portfolio are gathered already, and some additional data-gathering is planned, but many measures would require new (and newly coordinated) data collection efforts. Moreover, much of the value of undergraduate education goes beyond disciplinary learning, and thus requires long-term measurement of difficult-to-define concepts, such as alumni contributions and participation in civic, artistic, philanthropic, religious, and economic spheres.

While significant assessment and productivity measurement activities already exist at the University, they could perhaps be better coordinated and more systematically arrayed. Data collection and reporting should be unobtrusive and inexpensive, and should not detract from the goal of productivity by creating a new bureaucracy. New and planned technology on campus may assist these goals.

Moreover, we must face the possibility that measures of quality will actually decline if the University is to serve more students with fixed, or declining, State appropriations.

D. Measurement of the Productivity Plan's Operational Goals Most of the operational goals outlined in Section II of this report can be assessed by drawing selectively from the lists in Appendix C. For example:

•  1(a). Decrease in student time to degree may be measured by yearly progression ratios, available in the Registrar's student data base.
•  1(b). Retention of a higher proportion of students to degree completion also may be assessed by progression ratios and cohort completion rates, supplemented with information from surveys of non-returning students in order to improve degree completion rates.
•  2(a). Development of learning communities and increased student-faculty and student-peer academic interactions may be assessed by the proportion of students who accomplish required advising and the proportion of SCH generated in classes with fewer than 40 students (both measures may potentially be gleaned from administrative records), and these data can be supplemented with sample survey data on the percentage of students who believe there is a faculty member who cares about them. (This question has been asked regularly in UO student surveys.)

•  1(c). Quality of educational programs offered is typically determined by periodic program reviews by internal and exter- nal referees, combined with unit self-study. These are expen- sive and time-consuming, and hence relatively rare, but result in detailed descriptions of units' achievements, needs, and future goals.
•  2(b). Ready-made, standardized measures of student participa- tion and engagement in learning are not available, and in- struments for the purpose must be developed with care to insure validity and reliability. Assessments based upon ob- servational and field study methods are thus more appro- priate, although less expedient, than survey methods.


 Other goals will require implementation of new procedures for the Registrar, departments, faculty, and students, and new ways to measure them. For example:

 To improve access to and early completion of general education classes, students will be required to: obtain academic advising prior to first registration; register in either a language or math in their first term; register as early as possible in composition; and be monitored for progress at 30 hours. Students not making orderly progress would be required to obtain an advisor's signature prior to their next registration.

 To improve timely completion of degrees, students will be:

•  1) Automatically monitored at 75 credit hours completed. If significant progress toward completing group requirements has not been achieved, students and their advisers will be notified and academic advising will be required.
• 2) Required to declare a major or pre-major at 90 hours.
• 3) Required to obtain major advising at 90 hours to construct a plan of study to graduation. Students who have not made significant progress by 90 hours will be blocked from registration. Students who have made steady progress will be rewarded with guaranteed course availability in their major past 135 hours.
Assessment of progress toward the goals resulting from these practices will require new monitoring procedures coordinated among the Registrar, departments, faculty, and students. As the data become available, reports could monitor the proportion of students successfully accomplishing each goal.

Many of the operational measures of the objectives of higher education provided in Appendix C can be used to assess more than one of the primary and operational goals of the productivity plan. The measures provide a data frame from which the annual University of Oregon Portfolio can be constructed each year, to address issues raised by our external audiences, as well as to serve the University's internal planning needs.

(continued in Part 4) [Submitted by: Charley Wright
Tue, 29 Mar 94 14:55:28 PST] [Copyright 1994, University of Oregon]

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