Whence SLOs?

....As you know, California community college faculty have been spending lots of time and energy on “Student Learning Outcomes”—SLOs. SLOs have been a big deal since 2002, when the accrediting agency (ACCJC) adopted new standards that focus on SLOs or “measurable student learning outcomes”.
.....As we’ll see below, the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges (the ASCCC—or “the State Senate,” as it is often called) fought the adoption of those standards. But they lost that fight.
.....SLOs appear to be the product of the “outcome-based education” (OBE) movement, which has been a significant political force more or less since the 80s. According to Wikipedia,

Outcome-based education is a model of education that rejects the traditional focus on what the school provides to students, in favor of making students demonstrate that they "know and are able to do" whatever the required outcomes are…OBE reforms emphasize setting clear standards for observable, measurable outcomes.

.....You might think that conservatives are behind OBE—OBE loves standardized tests—but that’s not exactly right. In fact, as near as I can tell, right-wingers have been the most vociferous opponents of OBE, sometimes for daffy reasons. (See Phyllis Schlafly's What's Wrong with OBE?)
.....It appears that OBE (and SLOs) are in some sense the product of the prolific—but notoriously unimpressive—field of educational theory. Education theorists have power in the educational establishment, especially at the K-12 level. By the late 80s, their "measurable outcomes" notions bubbled up to higher ed. By the new millennium, they afflicted California community colleges.

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.....I wanted to present some information here on the blog (starting with this post) to help put this whole SLO thing into perspective. Toward that end, I present excerpts from an article that appeared in the State Academic Senate’s journal, called Rostrum, back in October of 2002.
.....Among other things, the article's author argues that there is no evidence that, as a way of improving learning, existing methods of measuring student learning fail or that monitoring SLOs succeeds.
.....Further, the accrediting agency embraced SLOs against the overwhelming opposition of faculty and faculty organizations. Essentially, the move to SLOs (he argues) is an expensive unfunded mandate to busy faculty on questionable activities based on an unverified educational theory.

The Accountability Game…

by Leon F. Marzillier…

.....…In June 2002, the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC) passed radical new standards by which to accredit community colleges, incorporating the idea of “continuous improvement” of “measurable student learning outcomes” (MSLOs) throughout. The ACCJC passed these new standards over the vociferous objections of respected faculty organizations. Nationally, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) has come out against modifying accreditation standards this way, and in California, the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges along with the Community College Council of the California Federation of Teachers (CCC/CFT) have condemned this radical change by ACCJC. Why?
.....The whole concept of MSLOs as the latest fad in education is somewhat akin to the now discredited fad of the ‘90’s, Total Quality Management, or TQM.
.....Essentially, the ACCJC adopted MSLOs as the overarching basis for accrediting community colleges based on their faith in the theoretical treatises of a movement, just as advocates for the use of TQM in education … were part of an ideological movement.
.....After repeated requests for research showing that such use of MSLOs is effective, none has been forthcoming from the ACCJC. Prior to large scale imposition of such a requirement at all institutions, research should be provided to establish that continuous monitoring of MSLOs has resulted in measurable improvements in student success at a given institution. No such research is forthcoming because there is none….
.....The new standards would require documentation and continuous improvement of learning outcome measures at the course, program, and certificate levels. This would require faculty and administration to measure outcomes that can be immediately documented, not long-term outcomes such as successful application of coursework in students’ careers.
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.....Often, objections to MSLOs are met with, “But, you faculty will define what the outcomes to be measured are.” This assumes that what faculty currently measure via exams and grades are not adequate, and that faculty should spend their time generating new and much more specific skill based measures. However, no evidence has been presented establishing that the outcomes of our pedagogical efforts are not adequately measured by our current approaches, or that new measures would lead to greater student success.
.....In addition, much that is most beneficial in higher education is often difficult or impossible to measure—but certainly is not measurable at the course level. A business department might feel the most important outcome is that their students use what they learn in the classroom successfully in a career in the business world. But this is not a learning outcome that can be documented at the course or program level.
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.....…[T]he MSLO movement utilizes a scorecard approach, in which you assess in percentage terms where your students are now in terms of a defined learning outcome, and how you would like to increase the percentage in 5 years, say. Then, you set as your goal the percentage improvement you want to make each semester! This requirement, that there be continuous improvement of learning outcomes, assumes that student achievement can be increasingly rationalized like a production process.
.....This push to document and improve student learning outcomes essentially creates pressure to focus one’s course objectives on discrete, skill-based and hence most easily measured variables. Quantitative variables are more easily tracked than qualitative ones. This over time will yield to a “dumbing down” of the curriculum, as broad capacities and more long-term, qualitative changes in student behavior and perception will be relatively de-emphasized in the push to measure.
.....How about faculty members in art deciding that an outcome is that students have at least a rudimentary appreciation of great art and how to recognize it? How does one measure that? How does one measure a sociology department’s desired outcome that their students have a more tolerant attitude towards other cultures and ethnic groups? You can probably think of more examples of the impossibility of measuring outcomes of what we do. Even if it were possible, is it realistic to expect a 2% (say) improvement per semester in any given outcome?
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.....Perhaps what irritates us most about the ACCJC’s action, besides the fact that they chose to ignore the best advice of the practitioners in the field (the faculty), is that tying accreditation to MSLOs means that the faculty as a whole would have to spend precious time and effort to engage in measuring everything that moves on the campus, diverting our energy and efforts from interacting with students. Will our colleges receive additional funding for these efforts? We seriously doubt it! So, we are being asked to engage in what virtually amounts to a huge unfunded mandate.
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.....… The Academic Senate plenary sessions passed resolution after resolution condemning the use of MSLOs as the basis of accrediting decisions, many being passed unanimously. These were votes of faculty members representing faculty at all 108 California community colleges, and represent the collective wisdom of California community college faculty. The faculty members sitting on the ACCJC are or have been active in local or state senates. It is unfortunate that they did not heed that collective wisdom and vote against the implementation of these new standards. Every fad that comes along will find a few adherents among the faculty, but when the opposition among our faculty is as strong as it is, it’s clear that the faculty is not split on this issue.
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.....Based on the resolutions passed overwhelmingly at its plenary sessions, the Academic Senate is studying ways to combat the institutionalization of MSLOs. The Academic Senate is working with both the AAUP and the CCC/CFT to consider our next steps, whether it is possible to delay implementation of these radical changes in the accreditation standards, as well as to explore alternatives to the ACCJC…..

These articles appeared in the Rostrum of February, 2002, a few months prior to the ACCJC’s adoption of new standards:

* “Ignore Us At Your Peril!”: The San Francisco Accreditation Hearing

.....“Ignore us at your peril!” Those were the closing words … during testimony at the Accrediting commission’s hearing on Draft A of the proposed new accreditation standards. The hearing, held on Sunday, January 6th in San Francisco, was the only one to be scheduled in the continental United States.
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.....…All of the participants were in communication with one another prior to the hearing, with the result that the overlap in testimony was minimal. It will surprise no one who attended the Fall Plenary Session, or who has read the resolutions generated there, that those assembled to provide testimony came to persuade the Commission to abandon their misguided emphasis on quantifiable outcomes, and to focus instead on educational quality….

* The Proposed Accreditation Standards: A Summary Critique

.....At its recent session, the Academic Senate passed a record number of resolutions concerning the proposed accreditation standards. Other faculty organizations have also gone on record opposing the proposed draft standards…. The Commission currently intends to adopt a revised draft at their June 2002 meeting.
.....…Acccording to the commission’s “Project Renewal” plan, the revision aims to import quality assurance approaches from business and to address inclusion of the wide variation in institutions now on the higher education “market.” But to widen the umbrella in this way essentially reduces the standards to the lowest common denominator….

"You cannot, in fact, dream up anything so preposterous that you will not find it being taught in some school." —Richard Mitchell