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Quality Enhancement Plan Initial Concept
The Handbook for Pilot Institutions of the Accreditation Review Project
specifies that each pilot institution will-as a major component of the
SACS Self-Study-submit a QUALITY ENHANCEMENT PLAN (QEP) on January 10,
2002. The Plan must be "clear and succinct," and it may not
exceed 100 pages (including a maximum 75 pages of narrative and 25 pages
of appendices). The Handbook further directs institutions as follows:
The Quality Enhancement Plan, engaging the wider academic community,
is based upon a comprehensive and thorough analysis of the effectiveness
of the learning environment for supporting student achievement and accomplishing
the mission of the institution. The objective of the QEP is to lead to
a course of action for institutional improvement by addressing an issue,
or issues, that contribute to institutional quality, with special attention
to student learning.
While the Handbook does not limit components of the QEP, it suggests
that it "might include" the following:
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An assessment of institutional improvements that have strengthened
the institution,
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Projected improvements and guidelines designed to ensure enhanced
quality, and a discussion of the institution's capability to address
those projections,
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Discussion of institutional mission, vision, and future goals,
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An examination of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and strategies
pertaining to the future orientation,
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A focus on student learning outcomes, and
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The inclusion of data, such as trend analysis, institutional capacity,
comparability and bench marking.
A Quality Enhancement Plan for ETSU
The ETSU SACS Leadership Team supports adopting a QEP aimed at creating
an environment more conducive to enhancing student success as evidenced
by their successful pursuit of pre-determined or expressed goals. The
degree of that success will be reflected in student retention, persistence
to graduation, and achievement by those students of other previously identified
educational, career, or other expressed goals. A plan to improve institutional
performance on such measures will be achieved at the University through
strategies aimed at eliminating barriers to student success and through
modeling best practices in the strategies. The Team further believes that
the University's primary challenge in creating a supportive academic environment
emerges from its ability to address successfully constraints and opportunities
associated with the students it serves. The University has the concurrent
imperative to provide programming and services that address the distinct
needs of these three relatively heterogeneous student populations:
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the native first-time freshmen who begin and pursue a college career
at ETSU,
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the increasing number of transfer students who often bring credits
earned from multiple institutions over varying time spans and also
bring a consumer's expectation that the University will fit those
prior educational experiences seamlessly into an academic plan that
will not delay their progress to a degree, and
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the increasing number of place-bound students at off-campus locations
who are seeking access to higher education through resources of the
University's extended campus (i.e., through courses offered live or
through distance learning technologies at off campus sites and center,
through the Internet, etc.).
Useful data relative to the first of those distinct populations (native
first-time freshmen) are the most readily available. ETSU has been a participant
in The Consortium for Student Retention Data Exchange (CSRDE) since 1994.
As such, the University has received a customized report that contains
benchmark data concerning first-time, full-time, baccalaureate degree-seeking
freshmen. Those benchmarks permit ETSU to compare with peers the preparation
of its entering students (as evidenced by entering ACT/SAT test scores),
its retention rates for those entering students after one and after two
years, and its cumulative graduation rates and continuation rates within
four, five, and six years. Those data are available for the total freshman
cohort as well as by gender, race, and national origin. ETSU has also
been a participant in the Cooperative Institutional Research Program Freshman
Survey (CIRP), the UCLA program which permits a University to compare
demographic, academic, and attitudinal features of its entering freshmen
with those of the nation's universities, four-year colleges, and community
colleges.
Data relative to the second of those populations (transfer student)
is also readily available, and the Tennessee Board of Regents has publicly
recognized ETSU on several occasions for its pursuit of articulation agreements
and development of a comprehensive, coordinated, and coherent seamless
transfer process. The University can document the source of its transfer
students, patterns of academic success they enjoy, a broad array of articulation
agreements and policies that depict how transfer credit is treated and
that assures compliance with SACS requirements for faculty credentialing,
and that it participates with neighboring Tennessee and Virginia institutions
in an Articulation Coalition that is proactive in addressing issues.
Data relative to the third of those populations (place-bound students
at off-campus locations) is more problematic. The University can document
(1) the source and trends in enrollment of its off-campus students, (2)
the number of approved off campus teaching locations, (3) the location
and delivery systems by which its students are served at those locations
(e.g., live instruction, distance learning, etc.), (4) the level of higher
education attainment characterized by the population of the counties that
comprise its historical primary service area and in which it offers extended
campus programming, (5) the growth in offerings and the standards employed
for Internet courses, and (6) its commitments to support services and
to the qualitative dimension to which it adheres in its programming as
reflected in SACS substantive change review. What the University cannot
document with certainty, however, is the degree to which its current efforts
are actually addressing the potential market and likely clientele for
such programming.
Campus Involvement in Defining Quality Enhancement Plan
ETSU will use the Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP) to define a course
of action for improving the University through eliminating barriers to
the success of its students and through modeling best practices aimed
at enhancing student success. That course of action will directly support
the University's mission "to educate students to become responsible,
enlightened, and productive citizens" through pursuing "a student-centered
community of learning" that is based in part on the core values of
encouraging people "to achieve their full potential" and achieving
"efficiency . . . through wise use of human and financial resources."
It will build on areas of strength in which the University has considerable
pride, but it will also aspire to pursue significant opportunities for
improvement that the University has and will identify through its various
planning and assessment protocols. In short, the goals of the QEP will
undergird both ETSU's pursuit of its mission and the public statements
and aspirations it has espoused to its governing board and to the general
public.
The University's success in identification of specific barriers militating
against student success and of best practices for enhancing that success
as well as the identification in the plan of
(1) priority strategies for addressing them,
(2) appropriate benchmarks of current status,
(3) measures for determining future success, and
(4) action plan for implementation will involve broad campus involvement
from all constituencies according to the attached calendar.
That involvement will be sought and documented through actions such
as these:
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Conducting through each Division an inventory of specific major
barriers to student success that have already been identified and
any major strategies or initiatives currently being pursued to address
them,
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Conducting open meetings of various constituencies (e.g., Faculty
Senate, Staff Senate, SGA, etc.) in which members of the SACS Leadership
Team solicit suggestions and information,
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Conducting meetings with individuals or groups who are pursuing
improvement strategies to determine if their efforts could or should
be replicated and if they feasibly could "scale" to address
broader issues,
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Using media outlets (e.g., student newspaper, newsletters, etc.)
to solicit suggestions and information,
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Developing as a "white paper" a draft QEP that reflects
the SACS Leadership Team's incorporation of the results of the broad
involvement referenced above,
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Communicating broadly to all campus constituencies that the draft
QEP is accessible on ETSU's SACS web-site and that responses to it
are invited by the Leadership team,
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Holding an Open Forum in for the Team to present the "white
paper" and invite further response,
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Achieving endorsement from the University's Strategic Planning and
Institutional Effectiveness Committee, and
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Achieving endorsement from the Presidents' Council.
Eliminating Barriers to Student Success
ETSU could enhance its mission "to educate students" and the
value it accords "efficiency" if it could reduce the percentage
of students who currently perform poorly, fail, or withdraw from its highest
enrolled courses. Unacceptable levels of student success in high enrollment
courses not only diminish the University's goal to educate students; they
also represent expensive failures later reflected in students who must
repeat courses in subsequent semesters.
Though others will clearly be identified through the QEP, one obvious
barrier to student success is readily apparent and warrants attention.
During the academic year 2000 (Spring and Fall terms) ETSU offered 1,324
separate regular courses. It is significant that fifty-two (52) of those
courses- about 4%--were so heavily enrolled that they accounted for 43%
of the total student credit hour enrollment in those terms. It is also
significant that fourteen (14) of those courses-twelve lower division
and two upper division-accounted for about 30% of the University's total
student credit hour enrollment; and they are courses that warrant particular
attention because they were ones in which 33% or more of enrolled students
performed poorly, failed, or withdrew (that is, they were awarded grades
of D, F, WF, and W). Those fourteen (14) courses represented a variety
of disciplines and were housed in eleven (11) different departments (Accounting,
Biological Sciences [2], Chemistry, Computer Science, Economics, Health
Sciences, History, Humanities, Management, Mathematics [3], and Spanish);
and six (6) of them are listings in the University General Education core
curriculum.
The Leadership Team is convinced that (1) analyzing causes for lack
of student academic success in those fourteen (14) courses, (2) pursuing
the goal of improving student success and achievement in them while addressing
reasonable academic standards and expectations for performance, and (3)
involving many faculty and staff in defining, implementing, and assessing
the effectiveness of strategies that improve student learning in them
will enhance the quality of education and the efficiency of providing
it at ETSU. The effort will certainly involve the "wider academic
community," including at a minimum faculty, academic administration,
advisors and counselors, staff providing academic support services, staff
responsible for academic assessment, staff facilitating use of educational
and information technology, and those responsible for classroom infrastructure.
Modeling Best Practices Aimed at Enhancing Student Success
The College Student Experiences Questionnaire (CSEQ) is a comprehensive
data source for examining the scope and type of the college students'
experiences and how those experiences relate to student learning. The
instrument defines the changing face of the college experience by seeking
to describe those events and associations that occur in the college environment.
It assumes that learning requires an investment of time and effort by
the learner in these experiences, and it also assumes that what matters
most in terms of educational outcomes is what students actually do with
their time and energies.
ETSU first administered the CSEQ in 1994, and it has continued to amass
a valuable longitudinal data base by periodically administering that instrument.
While there are differences that might lead to speculation as to regional
distinctions or influences or opportunities for students, these data depict
the overall similarity of ETSU's students to their national norm group-especially
with respect to their work patterns, the percentage of first- generation
students, their general motivations, and an increasing level of academic
disengagement.
The ETSU SACS Leadership Team concurs with a broad national literature
that notes the existence of a high correlation between evidence of student
disengagement and a lack of student academic success. In that light, it
proposes that the second major feature of the University's QEP will be
to plan, execute, and evaluate the effectiveness of strategies aimed at
enhancing student engagement and active learning. The context for this
priority is addressed in ETSU's 2000-2005 Strategic Planning Goals and
Measures, and projected outcomes and annual benchmarks for assessing progress
toward meeting most of the goals are depicted in the University's 2000-2005
Performance Funding Plan. The definition of appropriate strategies for
enhancing student engagement and active learning as well as plans for
implementation and evaluation of effectiveness will likewise require broad
involvement by the entire University community.
Documentation Protocol and Calendar
The attached depiction of Organization and Implementation indicates
the documentation protocol ETSU will pursue in pursuing the QEP as will
as the calendar for development and implementation.
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