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Association of American Colleges and Universities Calls for Campuses to Articulate and Assess Broad Set of College Learning Outcomes at the Highest Levels of Achievement

Board Statement Emphasizes Assessment Approaches That Deepen Learning Rather Than Standardized Tests Administered Outside of Regular Curriculum

Washington, DC - January 7, 2009 - The board of directors of the Association of American Colleges and Universities released today a new statement on assessment and accountability.  Our Students' Best Work: A Framework for Accountability Worthy of Our Mission updates an earlier statement released originally in 2004.  The 2008 statement calls for a focus on a broad set of learning outcomes essential for global citizenship and success in today's volatile and competitive workplace.  It makes ten recommendations to guide new accountability frameworks and presents data about what employers say about assessment and accountability.

"While many policy leaders are rushing to adopt accountability systems that rely solely on standardized test results, we have lost sight of the more important goal-providing all college students' the full set of knowledge, skills, and capacities they need," said AAC&U president Carol Geary Schneider. "Reliance on any one single test will provide a false certainty to students, institutions, and policy makers.  If we really care about our society's and our students' future success, we must adopt assessment and accountability systems that include multiple measures and that deepen learning even as they document achievement at the highest levels."

Our Students' Best Work makes a series of recommendations for campus action that will focus campus attention on three main goals:

• Making visible to students, parents, and policymakers the learning outcomes all students must achieve to be prepared for work, life, and citizenship;
• Developing multiple forms of qualitative and quantitative assessment of actual student work to document student achievement over time and to provide students with appropriate feedback about their progress;
• Using assessment results to improve programs and ensure that students are getting the broad liberal education they will need for success in today's world.

"As chair of AAC&U's board of directors, I am proud that AAC&U is continuing to provide national leadership on the issue of assessment and accountability," said Daniel Sullivan, president of St. Lawrence University. "AAC&U has been clear and vocal for years in calling for responsible approaches to assessment and accountability.  This statement affirms that commitment, but stresses that accountability systems must be worthy of higher education's larger mission.  We don't need yet another way to rank institutions.  We do, however need better assessment approaches so that students, themselves, can understand what is expected of them and so that faculty members can improve the curriculum and their teaching practices to ensure that students get the education they need and deserve."

In the statement, "AAC&U affirms that accountability is essential, but that the form it takes must be worthy of our mission.  This means we must hold ourselves accountable for assessing our students' best work, not generic skills and not introductory levels of learning."

The statement also recommends that campus assessment systems include: an orientation for all students to the institution's expectations and overarching learning goals; a plan of study that helps students connect the expected learning outcomes with his or her choice of courses, major, and activities; milestone assessments that help students see where improvement is needed; and capstone or culminating experiences through which students can demonstrate their cumulative accomplishment and their ability to integrate and apply their learning.

The AAC&U statement suggests that there may be a role for standardized tests within campus assessment systems, but that, given that "currently available tests only measure a narrow set of capabilities," they "can only play a small role in any comprehensive assessment approach."

To see the full text of the statement, see www.aacu.org; for other AAC&U statements and publications on assessment, see www.aacu.org/resources/assessment

AAC&U is the leading national association concerned with the quality, vitality, and public standing of undergraduate liberal education. Its members are committed to extending the advantages of a liberal education to all students, regardless of academic specialization or intended career. Founded in 1915, AAC&U now comprises more than 1,150 accredited public and private colleges and universities of every type and size.

AAC&U functions as a catalyst and facilitator, forging links among presidents, administrators, and faculty members who are engaged in institutional and curricular planning. Its mission is to reinforce the collective commitment to liberal education at both the national and local levels and to help individual institutions keep the quality of student learning at the core of their work as they evolve to meet new economic and social challenges.