Seton Hall Embraces Assessment with Technology: A Case Study
As higher education institutions face mounting pressures to better measure and document student learning, many are seeking solutions and processes that will help them rise to the challenge.
Seton Hall University, a private Catholic university located just outside New York City, recently deployed the Blackboard Outcomes System, a comprehensive institutional assessment solution, in partnership with the Blackboard Services Team.
Selecting and deploying an online platform for outcomes assessment was supported by Seton Hall's Teaching, Learning and Technology (TLT) Center, headed by Paul Fisher.
Fisher explains that the process began in early 2002, when faculty members at the College of Education and Human Services (CEHS) began looking for a portfolio solution to satisfy new reporting standards from their accrediting body, NCATE. The TLT Center launched several different attempts to get a portfolio program off the ground - working with two different vendors and even building their own portfolio tool. "We faced a variety of obstacles early on," says Fisher. "Third-party tools required faculty to use two different systems for posting assignments and completed work; the homegrown tool required a lot of internal support - particularly related to upgrades to our Blackboard environment." Together the CEHS and the TLT Center determined it would be in the university's best interest to find a commercial product that could provide the existing functionality CEHS wanted, and would be flexible enough to evolve as Seton Hall's needs changed.
In early 2005, Fisher was approached by Blackboard to join its product development partner program to help in the research and planning stages for a comprehensive assessment platform.
"This was a no-brainer for Seton Hall," says Fisher. "We had wide adoption of Blackboard solutions, we were searching for an assessment platform, and here was an avenue for us to provide direct input on a broad new solution that would meet many assessment needs across the institution, including in the College of Education. We jumped at it."
About two years later, Seton Hall began piloting the platform on its campus, and was soon deploying it for three targeted initiatives to achieve mission-critical learning goals in CEHS, for general education outcomes, and first-year writing.