On the Road

I am getting ready to leave to be part of a reaccreditation team at an out of state University. The University and the school involved are first rate and I am also pleased to be part of a strong reaccreditation team. I agree, approximately every other year, to be part of a reaccreditation team and I think this is an important responsibility for deans and provosts. I know it is always difficult to leave your office for an extended period to focus on the strengths and challenges of another institution but I also believe we are all stronger as a result of this self monitoring process.

I have been involved with accreditation for decades, first on the receiving end as dean and provost and also on the “giving” end once again as dean and provost. My initial experience was helping get ready for both Middle States and AACSB visits many decades ago and subsequently, I also gained experience as part of multiple visiting teams. There has never been a visit that I have been on or a visit that I have prepared for that hasn’t resulted in my being better informed and better able to function as dean or provost. In addition, self monitoring through a regional accreditation organization or a specialized discipline based organization is so much better, more helpful, and more accurate in my opinion than having government involved more than it already is in these areas. Just seeing how government has recently dealt with K-12 testing in New York or teacher and administrator evaluations has reinforced my strong feelings in this area. Only when over testing has reached crisis proportions does government finally realize that perhaps they have gone too far. And now, how do we reverse the negative effect on the students involved? I have to believe that if superintendents, principals and teachers were leading this effort the results would have been different, and I think the same situation applies in higher education.

Very often, accreditation teams seem to be populated by individuals who have been involved in many previous accreditations and previous visits. I recognize that I resemble that remark and I also recognize the value of experienced accreditors. But I also understand the value of new blood. I don’t have the data to know whether there are many new deans and provosts involved in accreditation activities. But I think this involvement is extremely important and should be encouraged. When the next opportunity arises to be involved in this effort, please say yes and encourage your colleagues to do likewise. It really does make the positive difference we are all looking for.

Extreme Testing

My older daughter came home last week, after taking a New York State ELA (English Language Arts) statewide exam.  Normally after she takes a test, she mentions whether the test was easy or hard and what, if any, were the areas that give her difficulty.  This time it was different.  She complained about a reading passage concerning a race between a pineapple (that did not move) and a hare.  She indicated that the passage made little sense and that the questions/answers made even less sense.  I actually thought she was overreacting until I saw a copy of the passage and the questions in the newspapers and on the internet. The paragraph was inane and the questions had no logical answers.  Ultimately New York State agreed, and will not count this question in the scoring of the exam.

My younger daughter’s elementary school New York State ELA took place over three days with a ninety minute exam each day.  The exam also started the day the spring vacation ended.  Not even a school day in between for the kids to adjust to being back in school.  Why does an exam like this need three days and a ninety minute exam time each day?  There was also a question on the math assessment for 4^th graders that had two correct answers as well as an 8^th grade math assessment question that had no correct answers.  Not good on any count.

Exams are necessary.  Evaluating students is necessary. We need to be able to measure a student’s learning on a regular basis and use the results to continuously enhance the education that is provided. But there are very substantial costs if the exam is nonsensical in part or if the exam is overly stress inducing.  The first and most obvious cost is the loss of confidence by both parents and educators in the government entity that oversees the exam process. Can bad questions really measure learning? Can questions without correct answers or with multiple correct answers really measure learning? Or instead, when a student is told to select the correct answer, will this just serve to confuse the student?  And will three days of testing of 3^rd, 4^th, and 5^th graders measure learning or, even more, seriously stress out the students?  How many of us, when we were in third grade, would have the sitting power, patience and perseverance to handle an exam that long for that many days?

But the real cost is a potential loss of the love for learning on the part of our kids.  What we all want from education is not only a knowledge base but also a respect for the importance of lifetime learning. If the questions and answers make little sense, if the exam stresses out young kids, and if the end result is a dislike for school and for education we have done a huge disservice.  This is a time for corrective action.  We need to rethink some of our exams and even more importantly some of our exam philosophies.

Test Takers

I had a terrific experience as a doctoral student. The courses, the faculty, the other students all made for a wonderful educational journey. I was certain economics was the right field for me before I began and I was even more certain by the time I graduated.  Within this wonderful experience, one moment still stands out, not because it directly involved economics, not because it represented an intellectual breakthrough, but rather because I learned an important life lesson.

That moment was when I took my statistics qualifying examination.  That day approximately a dozen students came to take the exam.  The faculty proctor handed out the exam and we all began.  Now the statistics qualifying exam had a reputation for being rigorous but also had a reputation as an exam where typically 5 people passed.  If there were a small number of test takers or a larger number, the results always seemed to be the same—five students passed.  About thirty minutes into a two hour exam, the proctor decided to leave the room while we all continued working on our examinations.  Shortly thereafter one thing changed.  Even though this was not an open book examination, one of the test takers took out the textbook plus a notebook, and began working on the answers with the added support in clear view. What did I do and what did the rest of the class do?  Each of us just kept working on the examination and following the rules.

About an hour later, the proctor returned for the last 30 minutes of the examination period.  Within a few minutes most of us handed in our exams and left the room.  I thought I did well on the exam but nevertheless, was a little apprehensive.   I didn’t say anything to the proctor as I was leaving about the person cheating, and to my knowledge neither did anyone else.  A day or two later, I found out that one of my classmates reported the student who cheated.  His exam was disallowed and I was told he was suspended from the program.  A penalty that was certainly deserved.

When the results of the exam became known about two weeks later, I was relieved to learn that I had passed.  Five students passed this qualifying exam, and going from highest to lowest passing grade, I was number 5.  If the cheater hadn’t been turned in, I assume I would not have passed.

I have been thinking about the Long Island students who paid other students to take the SATs for them.  For a few thousand dollars, they were on the fast track to a much more impressive SAT score and the resulting benefits in terms of gaining admission or being awarded a scholarship.  But very often, just as was the case in my statistics qualifying examination, someone cheating their way to admission or a scholarship likely precluded the person deserving the recognition from receiving it.  In all the publicity regarding the exam takers and those who paid for someone to take the exam, the real potential victims have not been identified. They are the individuals who did everything right, but nevertheless would have been shortchanged out of the positive results of their efforts.  I know it can happen.  It almost happened to me.

I often think that we are not as stringent as we should be in our monitoring and enforcement of academic honesty and I also think that we are often too lenient in the penalties we impose for violations of academic honesty.  If we are to be fair to the individuals who do everything the way it should be done, we (faculty, students, and administrators) need to do more to eliminate cheating. If we turn the other cheek to cheating, we are hurting ourselves and cheating the system that we are part of.

A Grating Exam

Anytime a semester ends, there are always multiple conversations about final examinations.  And final exams come in all sizes and shapes.  Not surprising, faculty focus their attention on the quality of the student work be it in response to short or multiple choice questions or in response to essay or term paper assignments.  Students tend to talk about whether an exam was “fair”: in other words did it cover the materials that the students were responsible for.  After that, the students tend to focus on whether the exam was clear or confusing and whether it was easy or hard.  Certainly there are extremes in all these categories but for the most part, faculty view the students’ work to be reasonable and responsible and students view the examination to also be reasonable and responsible.

A few weeks ago, I received a call from a friend who is also dean of a professional school.  Quickly the conversation evolved into a discussion of final examinations.  But this conversation was very different.  Normally as noted above, discussions regarding a final examination tend to focus more on the quality of the students work, and the fairness of the exam.  But this dean was focused not just on fairness but rather on exam appropriateness.  The dean’s point was that a faculty member had given an “F” exam, one which did not in any way cover the key points of the course.  On this exam, according to the dean, the student could receive a 100% and you would still not have any concrete notion as to whether the student did or did not understand the critical course material or did or did not achieve the course learning goals.

In higher education, for the most part, exam development is the purview of the faculty member teaching the course.  Exams are sometimes (but only sometimes) included in the teaching portfolios presented by candidates for reappointment, tenure, and promotion.  Exams are sometimes created by groups of faculty where there are multiple sections of a course and a common final exam.  But these examples account for a minority of all the exams given.  Mostly likely the faculty member develops, administers, and grades the exam.  Overall this system works well, but we also know for certain that it doesn’t work perfectly.  And just as there are brilliant exams developed on a regular basis, there are also very flawed exams developed as well.

Outcomes assessment and using exams in part to determine whether learning goals have been accomplished should help minimize the flawed exam problem.  But this is not enough.  Many department chairs and deans review grade rosters on a regular basis.  If there is something out of the ordinary (grades seem extraordinarily high or low), the department chair typically just asks the faculty member.  Chairs and deans need to follow the same procedures with final exams (and perhaps exams in general).  We all recognize that chair and faculty classroom observations are a tried and true method of enhancing a faculty member‘s teaching excellence.  The same type of support can also be invaluable in facilitating the most meaningful examinations possible.  All of us want more “A” students; we should also make sure there are “A” examinations for our students.