Submitted by Jack P. Adwell                

jadwe01s@uiuc.edu

University of Illinois

College of Education - CTER Program

.: Welcome to my EPsy590 ASA Major Assessment Project

The Major Assessment Project focuses on using assessments to make informed and meaningful changes in my curriculum. The project is written and submitted in stages throughout the  semester.  Each stage can be viewed by using the navigation buttons at the left.

.: Background information

 I am currently finishing my ninth year as an instructor at Richland Community College in Decatur, Illinois, where I teach information technology.  For this project I chose a new course that I was teaching for this Spring semester.   The course, IT274: Windows Active Directory, is mapped to a Microsoft industry-recognized certification.  It is comprised of both content-based theory and performance-based skills which are taught in the classroom network lab.  My primary concern focused on the performance-based assessments of the lab activities.  Just because a student can read and follow the step-by-step instructions for a lab exercise and successfully complete the exercise doesn't mean they really understand what they did and why.  I was looking for new ways to raise the level of my assessments to encourage higher order thinking skills and to provide more valid assessment results.  This project is my attempt to reach those goals  through performance-based assessments.

.: Thank you!

As you review this site and the progression of stages used to reach the stated goals, please feel free to borrow ideas.  All I askd is that you communicate with me your successes and even your failures.  Using assessments to reach the learning objectives of a course is a learning process and as we share ideas we all learn and become better teachers.

.: Next Page: Stage One