4. Improving Academic Program Review

Contexts | Core Values| Academic Program Review Pilot | Recommendations

Contexts

One of the most important institutional mechanisms for assessing progress at the departmental level is the academic program review process. This is a faculty-driven process, in which the Academic Senate’s Graduate Council has taken the lead role, with administrative support from the Graduate Division, while the Committee on Educational Policy has had a more minor role. This structural framework has produced a primary focus on departmental research and graduate programs, with less attention to undergraduate education and teaching. At the time we launched our accreditation self-study, a re-examination of this program review process was already under way. As described in the Program Review Essay in the Preparatory Review Report, the campus had identified two key areas requiring attention: (1) a need to develop clearer guidelines for the review of undergraduate programs and to create more integration between undergraduate and graduate program review; and (2) a need to remedy the protracted and burdensome timeline and administrative structure for academic program review and to provide improved support for departments undergoing review, especially around the delivery and analysis of data. The campus recognized that the accreditation self-study effort could help further these objectives, particularly with regard to the development of new criteria for evaluating undergraduate programs.

Since the submission of our first self-study report, the campus has made progress in addressing these issues. In Fall 2002, an Academic Program Review Working Group with administration and Academic Senate representation was convened. It was charged to develop a new, more centralized organizational structure and protocol for conducting academic program reviews in accordance with principles put forward by the Academic Senate. Until the Academic Program Review Working Group completes its work and new procedures are established, reviewed, and endorsed by the Academic Senate, Interim Guidelines are in effect. Under the interim process, several changes were instituted to bring the review process into better alignment with the Academic Senate Principles for Revising the Academic Program Review Process issued in Spring 2002. These changes included (1) eliminating the dual external/internal review committee structure, (2) adding an Academic Senate representative to the external review committee, and (3) making the Academic Senate discussion meetings optional.

In conjunction with the development of an interim process, new criteria were established for evaluating undergraduate programs in such areas as advising, academic enrichment opportunities, and integration of transfer students, which had not been explicitly addressed as part of the old review process. These new criteria were based on practices at peer institutions and the research literature on program review (Conrad & Wilson, 2000; Fox & Hackerman, 2003; Kuh, 1999; Wergin & Swingen, 2000). The new criteria asked departments to examine their discipline-specific learning objectives and learning outcomes for their students as part of their self-study process. To better support departments in evaluating their undergraduate programs, relevant statistical data were also provided. A significant new data element was the development of an undergraduate survey instrument, which was piloted with the Women’s Studies department as described below. Two reviews were begun in 2002-03 under the interim process, and have already had their external site visits—one is a department with both a graduate and undergraduate program (Physics) and one is a department with an undergraduate program only (Women’s Studies). Four more reviews have been launched under this interim process and will have site visits in 2003-04. In addition, four reviews were completed in 2002-03 under the old process.

In the remainder of this essay, we describe the core values that inform the restructuring of the academic program review process; a pilot undergraduate program review conducted under Interim Guidelines; and the recommendations of the Academic Program Review Working Group for institutionalizing permanent changes to the academic program review process.

Core Values

The Academic Program Review Working Group has agreed on the following overarching goals to inform the development of permanent procedures:

• Maintaining a review process that is faculty-driven.
• Developing the potential of the program review process to promote key campus objectives within a decentralized organizational culture.
• Creating a structure for the departmental self-study that is flexible and responsive to the individual needs of the department undertaking self-investigation.
• Reaffirming the importance of statistical data in developing unit self-studies and providing better centralized support to departments in preparation and interpretation of such data.
• Assuring that units address student learning outcomes in discipline-specific ways.
• Creating better integration between external and internal reviews.
• Maintaining a program review process that is distinct from professional or specialized accreditation.
• Making the Dean’s role in program review more prominent, especially as a means of promoting departmental follow-up and accountability.

In the case study that follows, we examine the pilot academic program review of the Women’s Studies Department, which was conducted under Interim Guidelines and was designed to help finalize procedures and criteria that could be applied subsequently to all academic program reviews.

Academic Program Review Pilot

Recommendations

The Academic Program Review Working Group has the following recommendations for revamping the current academic program review process:

• Create a permanent joint Academic Senate/administration committee, with appropriate staff support, to oversee the academic program review process.
• Identify an institutional home for the academic program review process to be centrally coordinated within a single administrative unit.
• Incorporate the criteria for evaluating departmental efforts in undergraduate education (developed as part of the Women’s Studies review) into the criteria for all academic program reviews, including a focus on student learning outcomes.
• Convene a single external review committee with an internal Academic Senate liaison.
• Require surveys of undergraduate majors and graduate students for all program reviews.
• Provide sufficient resources to ensure timely periodic reviews of academic units every seven years as recommended by the Academic Senate.
• Streamline the process that occurs after an academic program review has taken place, clarifying who needs to read and comment on the report and in what timeframe.
• Assure that the relevant Deans are involved in follow-up actions as a result of the academic program review report.
• Create a mechanism for regular follow-up that will enable the campus to evaluate progress and outcomes resulting from recommended actions.

Due to the current budget situation, funding is not available to create this new organizational structure for program review in the 2003-04 academic year. We will continue to operate under the Interim Guidelines with a scaled-back number of reviews, with the goal of operationalizing the new structure when the economic climate improves.

[Next][Back to Top]