As part of UNA’s reaffirmation process for accreditation, we are proud to announce the new Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). Our chosen topic for the QEP is Preparing the Pride: Experiential and Work-based Learning. The overall goal of the QEP is to increase opportunities, student participation, and institutional support for experiential and work-based learning at the undergraduate level across four domains:
Work-Based Learning, whereby students are prepared for entering the world of work. Examples include internships, preceptorships, simulations, practicums, co-ops, field experiences, job shadowing, and work-based projects.
Service-Learning, whereby students engage in an intentional and collaborative pedagogical practice that engages students in structured service to address an identified community need while also building an understanding and/or appreciation of the course content or discipline.
Mentored Research, whereby students participate in co-creating knowledge in the discipline, and their scholarship has the potential to make a contribution to the field by being disseminated to the academic community.
Immersive Learning, whereby students gain first-hand knowledge of course content and/or culture by learning within a new set of surroundings. Examples include education abroad, study away, and Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL).
The overarching goal of Preparing the Pride is to create a culture in which students embrace experiential and work-based learning. The following overall goals for the QEP have been identified, followed by four major student learning outcomes.
- Increase the number of experiential and work-based learning opportunities for students in undergraduate degree programs in each of the academic colleges and for the University as a whole.
- Increase the number of students participating in experiential and work-based learning opportunities in undergraduate degree programs in each of the academic colleges and for the University as a whole.
- Increase institutional support for experiential and work-based learning (e.g. increased relevant professional development opportunities and funding).
- Students will engage in purposeful experiential and work-based learning opportunities that result in the educational development of skills, knowledge, and dispositions.
- Students will apply course content to the practice of their discipline through experiential and work-based learning experiences.
- Students will demonstrate personal and professional growth as a result of their experiential and work-based learning.
- Students will build upon prior knowledge and problem-solving skills to respond effectively to the new and challenging demands of their experiential and work-based learning experiences.
The Preparing the Pride QEP will implement a number of strategies and activities to engage faculty, administrative support staff, students, and community stakeholders. For faculty and administrative support staff, these strategies include workshops, department liaisons, a faculty fellows program, and increases in funding for study away opportunities and professional development for experiential and work-based learning scholarly work. For students, these strategies include a student ambassadors program, seminars on experiential and work-based learning, student project grants, increases in education abroad scholarships, and a fall showcase for students to present the fruits of their experiential and work-based learning. Additionally, the QEP will engage community stakeholders through creating an external advisory committee regarding experiential and work-based learning and building a database to pair students with placements for work-based learning opportunities.
In order to assess the major QEP goals, the QEP will make use of both direct/indirect and summative/formative measures. Targets for opportunities were established starting with the number of opportunities currently tracked by UNA’s Office of Institutional Research and scaling increases with projected student growth. UNA recognizes that the different colleges, divisions, and departments have appropriate and acceptable differences in their emphasis on increasing work-based learning, mentored research, service-learning, and immersive learning. Therefore, the baselines and targets will be examined both by overall and domain-specific experiential and work-based learning (work-based, mentored research, service-learning, immersive learning), as well as at the college and overall university level. Measures will include the number of experiential and work-based learning course offerings, enrollment data, student-reported participation in experiential and work-based learning opportunities gathered from the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE), professional development and funding data, and faculty attitude data.
The QEP will make use of direct/indirect and summative/formative assessment of the four specified student learning outcomes in a global fashion to determine the impact of student engagement with experiential and work-based learning. Central to the assessment of the student learning outcomes will be the inclusion of a critical reflection assignment, whereby students will need to consider how their experiential and work-based courses build expertise and the ways in which new skills can be applied to other situations, courses, and their career. Additionally, assessment will include the use of student focus groups and surveys of recent UNA graduates and employers. Targets for mastery levels on each SLO will be established starting with baseline data collected from pilot courses in the Fall of 2022. As with the QEP goals, the baselines and targets for SLOs will be examined both by overall and domain-specific experiential and work-based learning (work-based, mentored research, service-learning, immersive learning), as well as at the college and overall university level.
One part of the QEP assessment plan is to include a critical reflection assignment in all QEP designated coursework in the future. This critical reflection assignment can take many forms and uses a common rubric within the course that the instructor will use to assess the aforementioned student learning outcomes. It will be entirely up to the instructor as to what format this assignment will take in their course, and whether or not the assignment will be included in the course grade for students. The rubric used to assess the critic al reflection assignment will need to be added to the Canvas course for instructors of QEP designated coursework, and will be aligned with Canvas Outcomes, which will allow the QEP Director to pull that data without the need for a report from those instructors. This assessment and rubric are being piloted in a small number of courses in the Fall 2022 semester.