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Sociology, BA/BS

Student Outcomes

Assessment of Student Outcomes

Outcome 1 Concept Definition

Use systematic reasoning to examine and evaluate information and ideas and then synthesize conclusions to propose new perspectives and solutions.
Students will:
• Define Sociological terms and concepts.
Objective 1 Utilize concepts in contextual application to explain empirical material.

Measure 1

2017 Status
Not Yet Achieved
Students are close to an overall acceptable level, based on the attached assessment report.

2017 Status
Achieved
Student learning outcomes have a positive distribution. In other words, they skew slightly high, but this may be the result of inaccuracy of the assessment device which has an unknown measure of validity and reliability.

Measure 2

2019 Status
Achieved
Essays are a part of all of our courses, so to a great extent, it doesn't substantively matter which course we use to assess written expression because even if we remained in the same course, the students change every semester. There would be no way to measure progress from one moment of measure to another. Neither has anyone ever developed some kind of fixed empirical standard, which is likely not even possible, which again points to assessment of opportunity (SOC 381 in this case) rather than a a faux-standardized procedure.

Objective 2 Elaborate understanding of concepts in written form.

Measure 1

2018 Status
Achieved
Since the previous analysis in SOC 287, the more recent findings in SOC 313 indicate that students have and/or continue to generally meet expectations in terms of understanding and applying concepts.

2017 Status
Not Yet Achieved
Assessment results indicate that we have exceeded the threshold for this outcome.

Objective 3 Identify concepts in a consistently measured format.

Measure 1

2022 Status
Achieved
SOC 101 Intro to Sociology seems to serve its purpose of introducing students to Sociological concepts, substantive areas, and application to the real world.

2021 Status
Achieved
Assessed according to the regular GenEd schedule.

2021 Status
Achieved
Assessed as part of the regular GenEd schedule.

2018 Status
Achieved
Assessment occurs on different section taught by different faculty, and even the same faculty change the course for purposes of updates, new pedagogical techniques, increased class size, and other reasons. The empirical validity of using these assessment report to measure "progress" is entirely unknown.

2017 Status
Achieved
Assessment reports indicate that we are achieving above the mean of our threshold goal.

Measure 2

2017 Status
Achieved
Based on the most recent assessment, the course seems to be meeting its learning objectives within the target threshold.

Measure 3

2019 Status
Not Yet Achieved
results from this initial report show that the course is accomplishing the SLOs, and at a high level--89% of the students achieved either a 3 (basic) or 4 (advanced) understanding.

Outcome 2 Theories in Context

Students will:

Identify and describe major sociological theories and the historical and cultural contexts in which they were
developed.
Objective 4 Compile concepts into coherent theoretical perspectives.
Objective 5 Compare and contrast different theoretical perspectives.
Objective 6 Explain empirical observations with theoretical perspectives.

Outcome 3 Undertake Research

Students will:
1. Be proficient in quantitative and qualitative sociological research methods.
2. Individually or in teams undertake a research project that collects or observes and analyzes empirical data.
3. Present findings.
Objective 7 Undertake a research project individually or in groups.
Objective 8 Present research findings in written form.
Objective 9 Present research findings in oral-visual form.

Measure 2

2022 Status
Not Yet Achieved
Initial report collected.

Outcome 4 Research Ethics

Students will be proficient in quantitative and qualitative sociological research methods.
Objective 10 Identify ethical issues in human subject research.
Objective 11 Resolve ethical considerations in one's own research.

Outcome 5 Sociological Argument

Students will be proficient in discipline-based communication. Objective 5: Students can write a paper that articulates a sociological thesis, provides evidence to support that thesis, and makes a critical or comparative presentation of sociological theory.
Objective 12 Develop one's own Sociological perspective.
Objective 13 Articulate one's own Sociological perspective in written form.

Measure 1

2022 Status
Achieved
Assignments have been adjusted to reflect the reality of actual career skills. Namely, written assignments have been increased in frequency and shortened in length. The goal is to create an ongoing dialogue between the students and the professor and the students with each other.

2020 Status
Not Yet Achieved
The course actually assessed does not always match the focus course, but it does match in terms of SLOs. That is the case here.

Objective 14 Articulate one's own Sociological perspective in oral-visual form.

Measure 1

2019 Status
Not Yet Achieved
The attached assessment is the first for this measure.

Objective 15 Position one's own Sociological perspective in relation to established perspectives in the field.

Measure 3

2019 Status
Not Yet Achieved
Assessment occurred in Winter 2018, but the report was not filed until Fall 2019.

Outcome 6 Written Presentation

Students will be proficient in discipline-based communication. Students can present their sociological ideas in written form.
Objective 16 Analyze and develop conclusions on new issues and material and present in written form.

Measure 1

2022 Status
Achieved
First report for this skill assessment.

Outcome 7 Visual and Oral Presentation

Students will be proficient in discipline-based communication. Students can present their sociological ideas in combined visual and oral form.
Objective 17 Analyze and develop conclusions of new issues and material in present in oral-visual format.