Texas A&M University-Central Texas Excellence and Achievement

A core value of Texas A&M University-Central Texas is “Excellence & Achievement” where we, as a community, strive to continuously improve, innovate, and exceed expectations. The institution’s mission states its purpose as a “public, upper-level university offering baccalaureate and graduate degrees” through “high quality, rigorous, and innovative educational programs” and “exceptional teaching, service, and applied scholarship” for a broadly “diverse student population” with sometimes limited opportunities for educational attainment. In the most practical sense, Texas A&M University-Central Texas is a model transfer institution, committed to

• Improving access and completion through close and continuous engagement with partner community colleges,
• Avoiding the duplication of effort and the wasteful accumulation of non-transferrable hours at the lower-division level, which increase costs while delaying degree completion, and
• Raising the educational level of the region by cooperatively building well-defined transfer pathways to baccalaureate and graduate degrees.

We focus our quality improvement efforts by employing a comprehensive and ongoing Institutional Effectiveness Model designed to define our purpose, identify opportunities, set goals, design strategies to improve, and select measures to determine success. The university determines progress on fulfilling its mission by the attainment of our Student Success Measures.

Guiding Principles and Frameworks

Accreditations

The University adheres to the effectiveness principles of its regional accreditor, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges as well as national and discipline-specific accreditations held by programs and colleges listed in our Institutional Summary.

Program Review

Academic programs conduct a full program review every ten years. Academic Program Review Guide defines the process. Between reviews, programs update the Provost two years after the decennial review on improvements resulting from the review process, complete a review of program data five years after the review, and begin external environmental scans two years before the decennial review. Support units are encouraged to conduct external reviews by conducting self-studies and inviting staff from peer and aspirational universities.

Assessment of Program-Level Student Learning Outcomes

Academic programs and support units identify expected outcomes to support their purposes in support of the University mission. The University assessment cycle runs from September to August. Programs set assessment plans in the fall, collect data in the fall and spring semesters, and report the results the following fall. Faculty and staff use these results to identify opportunities for improvement, define strategies to improve, and allocate resources. Faculty and staff execute operational plans and document their progress using TaskStream.

Expected outcomes for undergraduate and graduate programs can be found in the University Catalog below each programs' degree requirements.

Annual reports provide examples of how programs use evidence of student learning to successfully implement strategies for program improvement.

General Education Outcomes

Each year, University faculty rate authentic work collected from students after their programs to assess students’ attainment of the Texas A&M University System EmpowerU learning outcomes. The reports compare results from a variety of assessment methods and tools to the results from the student work ratings. Faculty at our two-year educational partners consider the reports to improve outcomes attainment. The following table provides a summary of the detailed reports to follow.

Ethical & Social Responsibility Sufficient (2018)	Globalization & Diversity Proficient (2018)
Specific Knowledge Sufficient (2020)	Integration Sufficient (2020)
Communication Sufficient (2016)	Problem Solving & Critical Thinking Proficient (2016)

Quality Enhancement Plan

The University Quality Enhancement Plan aims to establish A Community of Writers to improve writing at our University. The project includes strategies to improve student learning and faculty writing instruction and increase student writing outside the classroom.

University Assessment Committee

The University Assessment Committee provides leadership for the direction and support of university and academic program effectiveness, assessment, and improvement. The committee is chaired by the Director of Institutional Research and Assessment and charged with providing recommendations to the Associate Vice Provost of Academic Affairs relating to the administration of academic and administrative program reviews and assessments and the evaluation of the quality of assessment plans and reports.

Services

The Office of Institutional Research and Assessment hosts workshops on-demand for faculty, staff, and administrators. Contact IRE@tamuct.edu to arrange a time. Workshops can specifically address the student learning assessment process at A&M-Central Texas and how to create an exemplary student-learning outcomes assessment report. Let us know if you would like a workshop tailored to your department's needs relating to Program-Level Assessment, Course-Level Assessment, Accreditation Requirements, and Academic Program Review.

Consultations and Workshops

• The Student Learning Assessment Process
• Creating and Refining Unit Assessment Plans
• Developing Student Learning Outcomes
• Building Rubrics
• Curriculum Mapping
• Assignment Design
• Using Evidence to Improve Learning
• Creating an Exemplary Student Learning Outcome Assessment Report
• Conducting a Norming Session
• Feel free to share your assessment ideas with us!

Activities

• Developing course- and program-level learning outcomes
• Mapping course-level activities and assignments to the course’s learning outcomes
• Mapping course-level outcomes to program-level outcomes
• Designing assignments to match learning outcomes
• Designing rubrics, tests, or other assessment tools for course-level assessment
• Designing rubrics for program-level assessment
• Using results to improve teaching and learning in the course and the program
• Creating a program-level assessment plan

Resources