Modality Program Assessment Guide

Modality Program Assessment Guide

The following assessment guide was authored by Leah Schneider, the 2023 Provost Teaching Fellow.

Facilitating student success is central to course modality decisions. Academic units may enhance student achievement by employing diverse class modality formats purposefully to provide more flexible, accessible options and reduce bottlenecks in the curriculum. One of the key insights in conversations across campus with unit decision-makers and administrators was the desire for guidance on how to assess and utilize course modalities to enhance student outcomes within units. It is recognized that individual units have diverse student needs, pedagogical drivers, and faculty competencies that will factor in to enhancing student outcomes through course modality formats; thus, the goal is not to establish a standardized approach to course modality decision-making at the university. Rather, this assessment guide is intended to provide units with a template for assessing student needs within a unit’s curriculum and setting goals to improve a unit’s utilization of modality formats in their course development and scheduling decisions.

The Modality Program Assessment Guide template will walk you through a process of identifying an area for intervention, developing a plan to make progress in that area, and then monitoring your progress. 

Developing a Plan

 

Step 1: Assessing student success in your curriculum

What are your program’s areas of strength in relation to student success? What are areas of concern or areas for improvement? 

Step 2: Consider possibilities for intervention & supporting data

Purpose: Charge a committee or the full department to investigate and discuss potential areas for improvement in course modality utilization and decision-making within your curriculum in terms of both development and scheduling. Consider existing data sources or existing knowledge within the unit and/or college to inform the focus of your assessment efforts of student success in relation to course modality development and scheduling decisions. Potential areas of inquiry include:

2.1. Student Centered 

Course modality formats can be leveraged to provide students with flexible course offerings that meet student needs, enhance student access to courses, reduce equity gaps, and ultimately may contribute to more positive student course outcomes.  SERU data highlights key insights of student preferences relating to their course modality decision-making, including insights such as: (1) more students prefer major-related courses in-person and core education courses as online courses, (2) students prefer courses that are considered to be more challenging (such as STEM courses) to be in-person, and (3) 10% of respondents indicated a preference for online courses to achieve flexibility in their schedules. 

How well do your unit’s course modality offerings and scheduling decisions address student needs and preferences, meet student demand, provide opportunities for flexibility and accessibility, and mitigate potential equity gaps within the curriculum? 

Additional Thought Questions for Consideration:
  • Are there currently scheduling bottlenecks or conflicts that may impede student progress through your program?  
  • When courses are being offered in multiple modalities in the same term, are both filling up at a similar rate? 
  • When comparing course fill rates, are courses offered in different modalities filling up differentially?  
  • Are students in your program seeking additional scheduling flexibility to participate in experiential programs such as study abroad and internships? Are there specific terms of the year in which students are seeking greater flexibility due to participation in experiential programs and internships? 
  • Are a greater number of students within your program “non-traditional students” and/or working full-time who would benefit from added flexibility in scheduling? 
  • Are students well-informed about courses modality expectations when making course selections to select courses in modalities that will best fit their needs? 
  • Are student experiences in courses meeting their learning needs, including instructional needs, social needs, experiential needs, etc.? 
Data Resources to Utilize:
  • Undergraduate Modality Report by Subject (available upon request from UO Online) that provides data on student preferences, student demand, course outcomes, and modality load distribution within a unit
  • Student population data
  • Course fill rates (available upon request from UO Online)
  • TEP/UO Online: Meeting with TEP consultants or UO Online Instructional Designers to review your unit’s course outcome data from the Undergraduate Modality Report by Subject
  • Academic Advisors: Inviting academic advisors to share their knowledge of student experiences, needs, and curriculum bottlenecks
  • Student perspectives on course experiences: Thoughtfully identify themes from end-of-course experience surveys regarding student experiences in current courses
  • Other sources of information: Units may gather formal or informal primary research through focus groups, conversations, or surveys of their students to discuss their experiences with a unit’s curriculum and needs within the curriculum. 

2.2. Data Informed

Course modality decisions are to be informed by course and unit-specific data about current course modality offerings, in comparison to university norms. As a residential school, across Fall, Winter, and Spring terms, it is recommended that 70-85% of undergraduate student credit hours (SCH) by a unit should be in an in-person format; 15-30% of student credit hours offered by a unit should be in online or hybrid formats so as to meet student needs for schedule flexibility. For Summer terms, up to 100% of undergraduate student credit hours by a unit may be in online or hybrid formats to meet student needs for schedule and location flexibility. 

Is your unit in line with this recommended modality load distribution range?  If your unit is above or below the recommended range of student credit hour load distribution, is this load distribution across modalities supporting student success? Are there opportunities to better support student success by working towards the university’s recommended student credit hour modality load distribution?

Data Resources to Utilize:

2.3. Strategically Based

Course modality decisions are to be informed by pedagogical and strategic considerations of units when scheduling and developing courses in different modalities. Student experiences and course outcomes can be positively impacted when learning outcomes and pedagogical best practices are in line with the affordances offered by a particular modality. Unit heads are encouraged to consider the pedagogical aims of each course, in conjunction with student preferences and the affordances of each course modality format, to assess the fitness of each course for modality format development and/or scheduling. Units are also urged to consider how course modality decisions factor into the strategic goals for their unit and/or college. Offering courses in multiple modality formats can contribute to a unit’s ability to serve a greater number of students, particularly those who need increased accessibility and flexibility, and in summer terms when accessibility and flexibility needs are greater. 

What are the learning outcomes and pedagogical best practices associated with each course? How well do the pedagogical aims and best practices of each course align with the affordances of the selected course modality format? How is your unit’s utilization of course modality formats contributing to achieving your unit’s strategic goals?

Data Resources to Utilize:

2.4. Informed by Faculty Expertise

Units should strive to efficiently utilize faculty training, knowledge, and experience with course modalities when considering new course modality development and teaching opportunities. Faculty expertise is a contributing factor to time spent in course development, the learning curve of individual instructors in learning modality-specific best practices and technology, and the development of quality courses. Consequently, units should be mindful of faculty expertise when considering development and teaching opportunities so that their units are effectively and efficiently utilizing their faculty. Units should also leverage faculty experiences in modality instruction to encourage sharing of best practices, resources, and pedagogical excellence, with the aim to continually improve and enhance the quality of courses within the unit. 

How does your unit approach making staffing decisions for courses being offered in new or multiple modalities? Is your unit effectively and efficiently using faculty expertise to develop and staff classes being taught in multiple modalities? Does your unit (regularly) share pedagogical insights and best practices, particularly from those who have taught in multiple modalities?

Data Resources to Utilize:

2.5. Develop Faculty Expertise

Units should ensure that all career and tenure-related faculty have opportunities to be trained and teach in different modalities so that expertise is developed across a unit or department. Promoting faculty training and developing faculty expertise in course modality formats can better prepare a unit for future teaching needs and opportunities, and to address emergent teaching needs. Participating in modality-specific trainings and teaching in multiple modalities can also positively impact individual faculty pedagogical skills. 

How prepared is your faculty to teach in different course modality formats?

Data Resources to Utilize:

 

Step 3: Choose area of interest

Purpose: Based on what you found in your initial investigation in step one, identify an area of interest for enhancing student success through course modality work in your unit that you will address in the next year or more. Potential areas of interest could be:

  • Increasing student flexibility and accessibility by providing more sections of courses in diverse modalities in Fall/Winter/Spring terms or Summer term. 
  • Facilitating student flexibility and accessibility by assessing existing courses for new modality development 
  • Facilitating student flexibility and accessibility by considering new courses that could be developed in diverse modality formats
  • Facilitating student outcomes by working with your unit’s academic advisors to better inform and establish student expectations 
  • Improving faculty readiness by promoting and encouraging faculty development and training in diverse modality formats
  • Improving curriculum and course outcomes by promoting and encouraging faculty training opportunities to improve instructional design and skills for diverse modality formats 
  • Improving curriculum and faculty readiness by considering and offering regular opportunities for sharing pedagogical best practices, materials, and resources
  • Improving curriculum by assessing each course in a unit for course modality fitness (see Course Modality Comparison information)

Step 4: Make a plan

Purpose: For your identified area of interest, make a plan for what you will focus on this year as part of your assessment work within your unit. Your plan should include a specific goal, steps for how you will achieve the goal, how you will monitor success, and who is responsible for which tasks and duties. 

Action & Documentation

 

Step 5: Enact your plan

Step 6: Write your assessment report

What follows is an example template you and your unit can choose to follow when drafting your assessment report.

  1. Topic or Objective Addressed for this Report. This year, our department used the assessment process to focus on [insert specific goal here].

  2. Assessment Activities. Our department reviewed _________ data and generated a list of ideas for how we can better facilitate student success through course modality decisions and utilization. We refined our list and decided to focus on _________, which we think is a valuable improvement for our students. To work towards this goal, we identified the following steps that we would do over [insert the time frame for your plan]: [Identify steps from Step 3].

  3. Actions Taken Based on Assessment. What has changed within your unit (course formats offered, scheduling, faculty training and expertise development) as a result of your assessment work? How is student success being better facilitated through your utilization of course modality formats within your curriculum? 

  4. Other Efforts to Improve Student Success. Briefly describe one or two other improvement efforts that are not directly related to the goal you stated above. What other activities has the unit engaged in during this time-period to improve student success within your curriculum? 

  5. Plans for Next Year. Briefly describe tentative assessment plans for the next academic year. Which goals will be assessed and how? What follow-up actions will be taken as a result of this years’ analysis of assessment information? What other plans does the department have to improve the student educational experience?