Student Learning and Instructional Program Assessment

Instructional Program Review

Instructional program assessment is an integral piece in understanding and improving student learning. At Del Mar College, instructional program assessment happens in three distinct ways: 

General Education Assessment 

General Education includes six institution-wide competencies, which are: 

• Communication (written, oral, and visual),  
• Critical Thinking,  
• Empirical and Quantitative Skills,  
• Teamwork,  
• Social Responsibility, and  
• Personal Responsibility.  

Two competencies are assessed each academic year. To do this, student artifacts are gathered from courses in the core curriculum, faculty and staff members are trained to assess student performance by using internally designed rubrics. The results of these ratings are compiled and presented to multiple groups in multiple formats to understand student learning and create a plan to improvement.    

General education SharePoint Site

Annual Program Assessment 

Focused on yearly assessment of students’ performance on program student learning outcomes (PSLOs), annual program assessment requires programs to define the most important knowledge and skills students need to develop and then determine student progress in achieving these outcomes.  

Instructional Program Review 

For a deeper, longer-term understanding of student learning, Instructional Program Reviews are completed every five years on a rolling schedule. This means that a group of programs are going through the review process each year. These reviews are designed to accomplish the following: 

• ensure that the missions of the College, division, department, and program are being fulfilled; 
• assure the excellence and on-going enhancement of instructional programs; 
• identify program needs so that resources may be adequately budgeted and provided; 
• revise program curriculum or delivery to address changing educational needs; 
• reaffirm the need for- and viability of- the program; 
• build upon the program's strengths and promote its continued well-being; and 
• help prepare the College for periodic reaffirmation of accreditation. 

Each program is responsible for creating and executing its own annual assessment plan and for completing an Instructional Program Review according to the program review schedule. Assessment is a year-round and sometimes challenging activity, so Faculty Assessment Mentors led by the Lead Faculty Assessment Mentor are available to support and guide programs in all assessment efforts. An Assessment Specialist is also available to support all aspects of student learning and instructional program assessment. 

STAFF

Shawnee Bonnette 

Lead Faculty Assessment Mentor
STEM Division
sbonnet@delmar.edu

Willie Herrera

Faculty Assessment Mentor
IPS Division
wherrera@delmar.edu

Rachel Jennische

Faculty Assessment Mentor
CFASS Division
rjennische@delmar.edu

Sandra Ochoa

Faculty Assessment Mentor
BEHS Division
sochoa14@delmar.edu

George Woods

Faculty Coordinator of General Education
gwoods3@delmar.edu

Dr. Lucy James

Assessment Specialist
ljames@delmar.edu