The Avila University Social Work Program has made a commitment to achieving excellence in social work education. The faculty recognizes that this value can be demonstrated through ongoing use of effective multi-modal assessment processes. In addition, the faculty recognizes that such assessment is a continuous process, requiring skill, creativity, and dedication on the part of everyone in the Program.

The Program has developed a comprehensive assessment plan that includes activities and procedures for evaluating attainment of each program objective. There are currently fifteen objectives; thirteen geared to student outcomes, and two addressing faculty outcomes. The Assessment Plan guides the measurement of the Program’s ability to meet all of these objectives. The annual collection of data and analysis of this data result in Program viability and effectiveness by identifying potential areas for growth and improvement, as well as affirming strengths.

» Assessment Plan Infrastructure

The current Assessment Plan contains two components: Constituency Input & Assessment of Objective Attainment

Constituency Input
Assessment activities with the Social Work Program Advisory Board, current social work students, Field students and Student Task Forces all utilize collaborative relationships between faculty and constituency groups to provide formative data meaningful to program affirmation and continuous improvement.

Assessment of Objective Attainment
Currently, Program goals have at least two objectives with at least one performance indicator attached to each objective. There are a total of 15 objectives (two are Faculty objectives) and 50 performance indicators. Performance indicators contain measurable criteria in the form of knowledge, skills or values related to attainment of the objective. These criteria can be readily observed or assessed by the various assessment activities.

Goals, objectives and performance indicators are distributed to students in course syllabi at the beginning of each semester (August and January). Benchmarks are established for each assessment activity. Usually one benchmark is used for an assessment activity, but on occasion, more than one is established. Faculty have agreed to establish benchmarks based on developmental learning criteria and agreed-upon program standards.

The faculty chose an assessment design with multiple measuresforeach objective in order for results to be interpreted more reliably, given a small student enrollment. The end result is a set of complementary assessment activities that is organized to look at student achievement of the thirteen specific Program objectives from several perspectives; ultimately bringing more clarity to conclusions drawn from data collected.

The plan results in three types of data:

Data from course embedded activities
A variety of course embedded Key Assignments make up the heart of the current Assessment Plan. Key Assignments are specific assessment activities or measurement tools linked to the performance indicators. Other assignments exist in social work courses, but the Key Assignments are used as a central element in the Assessment Plan to measure achievement of the performance indicators.

Data from content/skill specific exams/inventories evaluated with university or national comparison group
The BEAP Values Inventory assesses a student’s identification with the values of the social work profession, specifically Confidentiality, Self Determination and Social Justice.

The university’s own Educational Outcome Assessment Committee (EOAC) Writing Assessment was added to the Social Work Assessment Plan to measure performance indicator 1.6.4 (written communication). Faculty chose to include the EOAC assessment activity in the Social Work Assessment Plan because it utilizes non-social work faculty, multiple trained raters for inter-rater reliability, and offers a university-wide comparison group.

The Area Concentration Achievement Test (ACAT) was added to the Social Work plan to measure objectives connected to CSWE Educational Policy content areas. The ACAT is a higher education outcomes assessment with curriculum specific feedback. ACAT results reflect the integration of the content component of a disciplinary major, providing information for individual, programmatic and curricular evaluation.

Data from external raters in social service settings
The faculty is excited to utilize the “outside of the classroom” opportunity provided by field instructors’ evaluation of student competencies. The Mini Agency Evaluation Tool and the Field Evaluation Tool provide students four refreshing and real-to-life assessment activities. At least three social workers, other than their instructors, rate student performance on the indicators. These additional ratings deepen student comprehension of the importance of their competency in these areas, motivating them to improve weak areas prior to graduation. This measure also provides faculty with valuable feedback from outside of the classroom, and in a setting critical to students’ ultimate success.