4/7 – In your current professional environment, how are educational experiences or program assessed? Is the evidence collected from the assessment use

At the Graduate school that I was employed, the program is assessed through the WASC accreditation and the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing (CCTC) accreditation. The university responds to standards by those accrediting agencies. The standards set by those agencies are valid and research based, but given the fact that those reviews are generally every five years, the process is lacking. Assessment should be continuous, similar to action research. I can’t say absolutely that’s not happening, since at the level that I work, perhaps I am not privy to it…but then again, if it were truly intensive, we (all) would be part of the assessment process. There then, is the weakness in the “assessment”, lack of participation from all members of the CoP.

Student learning assessment is generally done through the traditional route, test, papers, and projects. This year our teacher education students will be required to complete a series of assessment referred to by the CCTC as TPA's (Teacher Performance Assessment). TPA's are a series of activities in which the teacher candidate demonstrates their competencies of curriculum design. Candidates writes a lesson demonstrating their skills a differentiating instruction, they then tape themselves delivering that lesson in their student teaching assignment. TPA's have a lot of strengths. Since it's a structured model, it calibrates teacher preparation programs, assuring that all programs meet a minimum standard in teacher preparation. TPA's or the PACT model are designed and based on research. Built in to both models are a continuous process of evaluation and res-design. This force, programs to do continuous evaluation and self study.