APR Progress is Impressive!
by Sarah Brennan, HEO Associate, Office of Academic Affairs
Executive Associate to Provost and Title V Faculty Development
The OAA Assessment Fellows – established in fall 2015 by – then Interim – Provost and Vice President Christine Mangino – have made tremendous strides in helping faculty in the degree programs, units, and departments make progress on their Academic Program Reviews. The support provided by the knowledgeable and passionate Assessment Fellows has moved many programs from the self-study stage into the external evaluation stage. This semester six self-studies have been completed: Behavioral Sciences led by Marta Rivera, Black Studies led by Weldon Williams and Ana Ozuna, Latin and Caribbean Studies led by Inmaculada Lara-Bonilla, Office Technology led by Sandy Figueroa, Physical Education led by Michael Gosset, and Visual and Performing Arts led by Angel Morales. Two additional programs are near completion: Accounting led by Hector Lopez and Science for Forensic Science led by Olga Steinberg. All eight programs will host external evaluators in the spring semester.
The knowledgeable and passionate Assessment Fellows are: (1) Catherine Lewis from the Humanities Department who works with the Education and the Humanities Departments; (2) Nelson Nunez-Rodriguez from the Natural Sciences Department who works with the Behavioral and Social Sciences and Natural Sciences Departments; (3) Loreto Porte from the Mathematics Department who works with the Business, Library, and Mathematics Departments; and (4) Clarence Robertson from the English Department who works with the English and Language and Cognition Departments.
The Fellows began working together in fall 2015. At their point of entry, sixteen programs were in self-study stage. Thanks to the tremendous collaborative efforts between the department faculty and the Assessment Fellows only five (5) programs remain in self-study as progress continues to be made.
Academic Program Review (APR) is a valuable continuous improvement process that runs in a 6-year cycle. The self-study gives faculty a chance to review what has happened over the past five years. Self- studies are internal documents that provide the data to drive the process of continuous improvement.
*Correction
An earlier version of this post listed Ana Ozuna as the lead in Latin and Caribbean Studies. Ana Ozuna is working with Weldon Williams in the Black Studies program and Inmaculada Lara-Bonilla is the lead in the Latin
and Caribbean Studies program.
