Student Learning Outcomes

An SLO is anything that a student knows, does, thinks or feels as a result of an educational experience.

Measurable objectives set the parameters for the course. SLOs address what students leave the course with, e.g. the student will be able to write an essay with correct form and format in a variety of rhetorical modes. (Measurable Objective). Student will be able to explain the structure of an essay. (SLO).

Mt.SAC has incorporated SLOs into programs such as graphic arts, psych tech, business and the career institutes. Additionally, VTEA grants have supported SLO training such as Langford and Alverno Institutes over the past 10 years. Last year, accreditation has also added impetus to implement SLOs into the assessment process.

SLOs have been incorporated into accrediting standards by accreditation commissions across the country for the past 20 years. WASC is the last accrediting group to incorporate SLOs into its process. See the following sites:

• Anne Arundel Community College, Maryland
• Mira Costa Community College

The Academic Senate-appointed SLOs Steering Committee considered many models and chose the Nichols model because it gave the AUOs option, allowing us to include the support areas. It also adapted well to the grass roots approach the committee believed was vital to success while it honored past improvement initiatives on campus.

Mt. SAC’s original SLOs Implementation Proposal was based on the premise that the entire campus supports student learning. It also makes the assumption that success in a transformative effort such as this is tied to total campus commitment.

The SLOs/AUOs Implmentation team has been pleased to find a number of departments already working on SLOs. Some are using our model and some are not. In either case, we have recorded the departments’ efforts, and we have worked with faculty members on any minor adjustments needed for consistency with campus-wide efforts and for documentation purposes.

Student learning experiences don’t just occur in the classroom. Support for learning is required across the college community. Example: Students will be able to readily utilize the available resources in the library.

Actually, the core concepts are similar. SLOs are a concrete way to measure our effectiveness.

While SLOs can be generated in a two hour meeting, assessing them could require as much as a year’s planning.

Money will be needed to support the assessment process, but SLOs will not drive the budget process or determine the allocation of funds.

These are contract issues. Contact the Faculty Association for more information.

The primary difference is in the use of the assessment results. The assignment of a grade quantifies the overall level of student achievement or competency, allowing for a common basis of comparison assuming all faculty utilize the same standards for grading. The grade, however, gives no information about what a student has learned. Additionally, SLOs look at the student population, not the individual, achievement.

No. See Number 10.

Then…congratulations! You have just learned something very important about either your program or your assessment instrument or both. Results may be unexpected, but they are always fruitful inasmuch as they give us information about what we are doing.