Course Rubrics
When the ECE program was first established in 2010, the faculty spent as great deal of effort defining a matrix of courses and student outcomes. For each course in the curriculum, a level of applicability was assigned. The levels are low, medium, and high, designated by a blank, M and H, respectively, in the matrix (or curriculum grid). Only the student outcomes that ranked high in the matrix were assigned a performance indicator (PI) in the course rubric. Levels of applicability were assigned to the courses outside the CE program as well, but none of them ranked higher than medium, so they were not connected to a PI and are therefore not shown in the table.
At the conclusion of each semester, faculty prepare a rubric for each ECE course they taught by assigning a level of achievement to each PI for the student outcomes in the rubric. The levels of achievement are (1) unsatidfactory, (2) developing, (3) satisfactory, (4) exemplary. An example of a rubic can be seen in the full report.
The continuous improvement process for courses occurs on two levels -- the course level and the program level. At the course level, the instructor makes independent improvements to the course. When the score, S, for a given PI is 3 or greater, no action is taken by the instructor to improve the course. When S falls below 3, the instructor identifies corrective actions to implement the next time that he/she teaches the course.
At the program level, the instructor, with input from department faculty, makes improvements to the course. If the mean score for a given course is 2.67 or greater, no action is taken to improve the course, but a mean score of less than 2.67 suggests deficiencies in the course that require discussion and correction by the instructor and/or program faculty. For the example rubric shown in the report, action is to be initiated by the instructor for two PIs, but no program level action is required. Prior to fall semester 2014, the program-level triggered point was increased from 2.0 to 2.67 because the faculty felt that the threshold for triggering improvements at the program level as too low.
