The current course really had no means to assess current industry events or writing or critical thinking skills.
I needed a way to assess for student learning on current industry events and wanted to be able to assess critical thinking skills and writing skills.
I created two writing assignments that were based on current industry events, Proposition 127 in Arizona and the Camp Fire in California. Both assignments required the student to research the events, write a two page report, and the report had questions that the student had to critically think about and develop their own opinions. For example students had to research to find out the cause of the Camp Fire then had to come up with ways they would prevent it from happening again.
The change provided me a means to determine if the student learning outcome of learning recient industry events was being accomplished. It also gave me two assignments where I could evaluate students critical thinking and writing skills and to be able to turn in an assessment to the Student Acamedic Achievement Committee.
One of the student learning outcomes of this class is to discuss current industry events. It is difficult to assess discussing events and generally the whole class doesn't participate in discussions equally. By creating a writing assignment to discuss and analyze events I gained a strong means to measure an SLO and both writing and critical thinking. The assignment was a good way to start off the class and to get student engagement for the day.
Comments
Thank you for taking time to document what you have done in your class. I love how you used current events in these assignments to make the content more relevant; this is especially important in your field. Also, thank you for taking time to tie this into the SAC rubric.