Assessment

Step 1. Choosing an Assignment

Since your course is aligned with the General Education Critical and Analytical Thinking learning objective, it should already include activities or assignments that promote and develop these skills. Most important of all, the assignment(s) you select for the purposes of this assessment study should ask students to demonstrate Critical and Analytical Thinking.

• • It is best practice to use an already existing assignment rather than create a new one solely for the purpose of the assessment study.
  • When choosing from available assignments, assignments that are more valuable in a student’s overall grade are typically better as students take them more seriously. This leads to a more authentic demonstration of their skills. If possible, we advise you to choose assignments worth at least 10% of a student’s grade.
  • Culminating assignments such as final projects, presentations, papers, pieces, etc. are typically the best. Still, you should use the assignment best aligned with the Critical and Analytical Thinking objective, which will provide students with an opportunity to show their abilities.
  • There may not be a single assignment in your course that addresses each criterion of this rubric, and that is okay. In that case, you may use different assignments for each criterion in order to ensure that students are evaluated on all Critical and Analytical Thinking criteria.

Step 2. Applying the Rubric

The Critical and Analytical Thinking rubric was designed by Penn State faculty to be relevant across disciplines. It focuses on three criteria:

• • • EXPLORATION – Students identify problems, issues, and assumptions and gather relevant information and data. 
    • ANALYTICAL THINKING – Students analyze and reflect on the information collected using the appropriate tools and prior knowledge.
    • JUDGMENT AND CONCLUSION – Students provide evidence-based formulations of conclusions and judgments as a guide to belief and action.

Each of these criteria should be individually evaluated on a simple four-point scale:

• • Not Demonstrated– Inadequate, superficial, ineffective, inappropriate, includes multiple errors
  • Developing – Somewhat inadequate, superficial, somewhat effective, sometimes appropriate, includes some errors
  • Satisfactory – Mostly adequate, relevant, mostly effective, mostly appropriate, few errors
  • Exemplary – Beyond adequate, comprehensive, very effective, appropriate, virtually error-free

In the example marked-up rubric above, the student’s work has been assessed as Satisfactory on EXPLORATION, Exemplary on ANALYTICAL THINKING, and Developing on JUDGMENT/CONCLUSIONS. This would result in that student receiving scores of 2, 3, and 1, respectively.

Instructors of fewer than 20 students are expected to complete an assessment for each student. Instructors with more than 20 students may 1) assess all students or 2) assess a random sample of, at least, 20 students or 10% of the total course enrollment – whichever is larger.

Step 3. Using the Spreadsheet

We encourage you to use the provided spreadsheet to track individual student scores on the rubric. If you do so, the spreadsheet will do the necessary calculations for you. If you do not have any assignments that address a specific criterion, you should leave that column blank when entering your data in the spreadsheet. 

In the screenshot below, the scores from the marked-up rubric above have been entered into the provided spreadsheet. You can repeat this process for all the student work you plan to evaluate for the assessment study. If your course did not have an assignment that addressed a specific criterion, you should enter “NA” (not applicable) in that column for each student. 

Step 4. Submitting Your Scores

Submitting your rubric scores is quick and easy. First, go to the spreadsheet tab labeled “Aggregate Totals” (the third tab from the right at the bottom of the spreadsheet). 

Once you have navigated to the “Aggregate Totals” tab, you will see a table that looks like the screenshot below.  Take the numbers there and enter them into the online form.  You can access the online form via the link you received in your email or click here. 

Once you have entered your rubric scores into the online form and completed a few additional questions, your work is complete!

Is participation mandatory?
Participation in the study, in the strictest sense, is not mandatory, but it is probably not appropriate to consider it elective either.  Penn State faculty own the General Education curriculum and its delivery, and assessment of General Education is a requirement supported by the Faculty Senate and by our accreditors.  In other words, we have an obligation as an institution to engage in the assessment of Gen Ed, and this study is one of the ways Penn State does so.  You can elect not to participate but doing so abdicates that shared responsibility.

Which of my courses is a Critical and Analytical Thinking course?
If you are teaching a Critical and Analytical Thinking course in fall 2023 or spring 2024, you are invited to participate in this study. Fall course instructors will receive their invite on August 31, 2023; spring instructors will receive theirs in January 2024. Your invitation will name the specific course to use. The course attributes can also be found in the Undergraduate Bulletin.  Once you have found your course, scroll down to see the various attributes or endorsements listed there.

Why does my course have this particular General Education Learning Objective?
When a course is proposed (or recertified) as a General Education course, 2-4 General Education Learning Objectives must be selected. The proposal requires justification and examples of how the course will meet the selected objectives. Curricular proposals are available in the Curriculum Archives if you would like to look at the course proposal and better understand the intentions when the course was proposed. The course proposal does provide examples of how the Learning Objective may be assessed, but it is only a suggestion, it is not required that you do it that way.

I’m teaching multiple Critical and Analytical Thinking courses – which do I use?
Your invitation will specify the course selected for participation. You are not expected to apply the rubric in multiple courses. If you teach multiple sections of the selected course, please select whichever is most convenient to you by virtue of your course structure or enrollment. If in doubt, we recommend selecting the largest section. You need only to assess one section of one course.

I have misplaced my email invitation and I teach a course or multiple courses that meet both learning objectives – how do I know which study I’ve been invited to participate in?
You can reach out to the Office of Planning, Assessment, and Institutional Research at assessment@psu.edu for this information.

The assignment I want to use happens late in the semester. Can I still participate?
We encourage instructors to select culminating assignments taught near the end of the semester. The submission deadline is June 14, 2024. You can submit your scores anytime up until the deadline.

All my assignments are multiple-choice. How do I apply the rubric?
Please reach out to assessment@psu.edu to discuss your options for participation.

Are we being compensated for participating?
Unfortunately, we have no funding to provide at this time, though we acknowledge and understand that this may impact your participation. With this in mind, we worked hard to make your participation as easy as possible.