My assessment philosophy is informed by the fact that most of my students will not become professional sociologists, which makes my course the only exposure to sociology they will likely have. Because of this, I gear assessment toward seeing if they have a basic understanding of concepts, as well as have they demonstrated the applicability of sociological theory to their everyday lives. First, half of the course grade comes from in-class work, ranging from simple in-class participation to group discussion to classroom activities. These are more of an “A for effort” sort of grading and gives students who are academically underprepared a way to earn points even if they are a poor writer or a poor test taker. Second, I have found that if I want students to read the material, I must incentivize it somehow. To that effect students must complete an objective multiple-choice quiz on the assigned reading prior to class on Blackboard. This does two things–it forces students to think about the material in advance of discussion, and it gets them logged into Blackboard so that they see reminders, announcements, and course messages. Third, I feel that any college course must include an element of writing that gets the student in the habit of how to write, format, and cite a college paper–even if they are writing at a remedial level. Early in the semester I have students write a 2-page analysis of any current event in the news, applying sociological theory. Students are certainly evaluated on the writing quality of the paper, but even if it is horribly written, the rubric still gives them a passing grade if they followed the instructions. Later in the semester, I have a larger “colloquium” project in which they must both write a current event paper and also facilitate an in-class discussion of their topic with a 5-10 minute PowerPoint. We do this the last week of class because this is the time I find most difficult to hold students’ attention. By making them facilitate the class it engages them in the classroom discussion and holds them responsible for participating. It also allows them an opportunity to incorporate material they have learned from across the semester into a relevant news article, serving as a summative assessment. Last, there are three non-cumulative exams, each one about 10% of the course grade. I mainly hope to get a testing effect, no matter how minimal, to encourage students to read and study the material. These exams are primarily multiple choice but because each one is only 10%, they can afford to fail one and still do well in the overall course. My assessment philosophy is to design grading in such a way that no single grade will cause a student to fail a class. They have multiple opportunities across the term to self-evaluate how well or poorly they are doing, and then jump back if they need to.
Matthew West 