I-O Skills Applied to Higher Education Lead to National Honor for BGSU

Clif Boutelle

Just because students have earned high letter grades and passed courses required in their fields of study does not mean they have necessarily acquired the skills that will identify them as critical thinkers and problem solvers.

So, how can a university determine whether its courses and programs provide students with the skills they will need for personal and professional success?

Bowling Green State University has been answering that question by applying I-O skills and processes to define and assess student learning in programs and courses, establish specific learning outcomes associated with these programs and courses,  assess and measure outcomes to establish their effectiveness, and clearly communicate how evidence will be determined to show that students have successfully met the outcomes.

It is an ambitious task but Bowling Green had SIOP Fellow and past president Milt Hakel, a professor of I-O psychology and Ohio Eminent Scholar, leading its effort.

For the past decade, Hakel and his team have been heavily involved in developing outcomes and ways to measure success and how well students are learning the skills and knowledge they will need in their lives.

And now their work has been recognized at both the state and national levels.

The latest is the 2007 CHEA Award for Institutional Progress in Student Learning Outcomes, presented by The Council for Higher Education Accreditation. BGSU was honored January 31, 2007 at the CHEA Conference in Washington, D.C.

“Given the current debate regarding the role of student learning outcomes in accreditation, Bowling Green State University serves as a solid example of the enormous progress that institutions are making through the implementation of comprehensive, thoughtful, and effective initiatives. We are delighted to recognize this distinguished institution with this award,” CHEA President Judith Eaton said in a news release announcing the recognition.

BGSU is one of only 5 institutions in a nationwide pool of 31 selected for the honor. Other winners are Mesa Community College in Mesa, AR, Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, OK, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terra Haute, IN, and the University of Saint Mary in Leavenworth, KA.

Calling the award a “rare honor,” Hakel said that the skill sets I-O psychologists possess are ideal in meeting the challenges of defining student learning outcomes, measuring them, and fostering effective performance.   He noted, “Bowling Green’s success demonstrates that I-O skills and technical knowledge can be well used to address issues in education.”

Hakel’s team persuaded faculty in all disciplines to define learning outcomes for their majors and then identified some common denominators across all fields of study.  Those outcomes include inquiry; creative problem solving; examining values in decision-making, oral and written skills; and teamwork and leadership skills. He noted, “I-O people are good at defining and refining fuzzy constructs such as ‘critical thinking,’ so now these outcomes have become the focus of the general education program.”

But defining outcomes and measuring them is not enough—how does one document effective student performance?  Although transcripts will show prospective employers and graduate colleges that students have passed their courses, received good grades, and earned a degree, Bowling Green students have something else going for them: electronic portfolios.

Using their ePortfolios, students can showcase their work and provide evidence of how they apply what they have learned.  Hakel cited one student who was hired for a teaching position after submitting an ePortfolio that included video clips of student teaching in classrooms.

About 14,500 students have ePortfolios, many showing examples of their work. Students retain the authority to decide whether to make their work public.

Hakel said the ePortolio initiative provides a practical alternative to “one-size-fits-all standardized testing—we are documenting educational accountability while maintaining a sharp and clear focus on what really counts: student success.”  Incidentally, Hakel’s ePortfolio URL is http://mhakel.with.bgsu.edu.

For the CHEA award, institutions were judged on the basis of four criteria: articulation and evidence of student learning outcomes, successful outcomes, informing the public about outcomes, and using outcomes for improvement.

In addition, CHEA noted that BGSU showed outstanding achievement in:

• Attention to outcomes embedded in an institutional culture
• Use of current technology in the methods and tools to track outcomes
• The extensive involvement of faculty and strong faculty support
• Institutional leadership that is dedicated to the importance of outcomes
• Approaches to outcomes that can be replicated at other institutions