Self-Study Design - Howard University, Graduate School

late spring 2008. The actual site visit will occur during the 2008–2009 academic year. In the
months ahead, the work groups will present a set of detailed timelines towards these goals.
Plans for the Collection, Analysis, and Infusion of Assessment Data into the Self-Study
Exercise
Assessment of all phases of university life will permeate all aspects of this inquiry. Accordingly,
the Self-Study will work in close collaboration with several university units charged with
assessment, data gathering and planning. These units shall be the recently created Office of
Assessment and Evaluation (OAE), the Office of Institutional Research, CETLA, and data
gathering units within the Office of the Provost.
The OAE will coordinate data gathering efforts for the Self-Study in concert with the Office of
the Provost, and it will work directly with relevant work groups to construct, administer, analyze
and prepare reports on specific aspects of university life, policy, and practice deemed appropriate
by the work groups. To prevent unnecessary redundancy, chairs of work groups with desires to
collect original data of stakeholder assessments of the extent and quality of campus life,
resources, and support systems will work with the OAE to construct generic instruments for
faculty, student and staff constituencies.
Additionally, two Self-Study work groups—the Work Group on Assessment of Student Learning
and the Work Group on Institutional Assessment—will pay particular attention to the extent,
quality, and use of assessment data to guide University policy and practice. The Work Group on
Assessment of Student Learning will focus on the use of assessment data by the faculties in the
various schools and colleges to enhance teaching and learning by their students. The Work
Group on Institutional Assessment will focus more generically across all “Characteristics of
Excellence” to determine the quality and extent to which assessment data are collected and used
to inform institutional planning, processes, policies, and operations.
Communications with Work Group and University Community
The Office of the University-wide Self-Study has implemented several measures to communicate
with the Howard community to ensure that the Self-Study process is interactive, transparent, and
collaborative. These techniques include weekly updates on Self-Study activities and milestones
through an electronic newsletter with the John H. Johnson School of Communications. A Web
site has been designed specifically for the Self-Study and it is linked to the Howard University
homepage. Additionally, steering committee members have access to draft documents through a
password-protected Web site that provides them a forum to comment and share their work.
The Self-Study design statement and the draft of the final report will be distributed to the
Executive Committee, Steering Committee, Work Groups, and Board of Trustees. The final Self-
Study report will be made available to the entire Howard University community.
Organization of Final Self-Study Report
A timetable has been prepared for completing the draft self-study, vetting it with the university
community, and submitting it to Middle States in early 2009 in preparation for a site visit in
spring 2009. A copy of the timetable is presented in Appendix B.
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