PART 3

Your task will be to prepare a short narrative in which you propose some key indicators that could be used to determine whether your institution is making progress on the challenges presented by the board.

An indicator is a measure of a particular quality, usually something that is hard to define or measure. Indicators do not have to capture every aspect of that quality — you might use several indicators to get a good picture. For example, if you were interested in measuring how “wealthy” people are, you might choose “annual income,” or “assets owned,” as indicators of wealth. These indicators won’t give you a complete picture, but they will give you important information.

In higher education, we often use indicators to measure amorphous qualities such as “learning” or “student success”. In future courses, you will explore the process of defining measures, establishing indicators, and gathering data that can be used for assessment in much more detail. For this assignment, you will start thinking about what kinds of indicators an institution might use to begin to investigate issues such as learning and success.

Using the readings and other resources provided this week, write 1–2 pages on ways you might define indicators to assess your institution’s progress toward the goals presented by your board. If you wish, use a bulleted list to propose possible indicators, and then explain how convincing these indicators might be to your board and other stakeholders. I recommend the use of headings throughout your paper to indicate transitions from one topic to the next.

PART 4

You will complete the last part of your Course Project, pull all of the pieces together, ensure your work is formatted in correct APA style, and submit it in its entirety for credit. If needed, review the scenario presented in the Course Project Overview section of Week 1. For this final piece, you will create a list of resources that your institution’s task force could use in further researching and developing your plan.

Using your exploration of professional associations and foundations in higher education, identify at least three organizations that provide information or resources that your task force could use in addressing the challenges presented by your board. For each, provide:

• The name and Web site of the organization
• A brief summary (1–2 paragraphs) of the organization’s purpose and major agenda items
• A short description of resources provided by the organization that could be useful to your institution in addressing the board’s challenges

Formatting Your Assignment: Follow APA style to format your paper. Combine your assignments from Weeks 3, 4, and 6 with this week’s assignment; include a cover page, an introduction, a conclusion, and a reference page.

Be sure and identify the institution, based on the profiles provided (see assignment criteria) or the one that you chose. Your paper should be written with the specific profile that you chose in mind.

Based on the assignment criteria, here are some suggestions for headings:

Importance of Student Learning and Graduation

Changes in Student Needs

Focus on Graduation and Learning

Political and Economic Factors

Concerns About Student Learning and Graduation

Board Members Concerns

Indicators

Professional Organizations

Conclusion (Always have a concluding paragraph with heading).