THE INFORMER PAGE 3

APRIL 28, 1992

Ph ne Preliminary R
Cross-College Assessment
Committee

Concerns about students who enroll in courses for which
they are ill prepared has spawned the Cross-College Assessment
Committee, a sub-committee of instructional board, to examine
the effectiveness of College entrance assessments. The Commit-
tee began a pilot assessment project of first year students who
entered the college in January ’92. It will make its preliminary
., Teport in an afternoon meeting on Monday, May 11. The com-
mittee has explored whether certain assessment tools are useful
in placing students and predicting their College performance,
and if better assessment would benefit new students. The pilot
study also investigated whether the high school GPA is an
adequate predictor of college success or whether additional
measures of competence are required.

At 1 p.m. May 11, the committee will report preliminary
results of Phase One of the project. It will welcome suggestions
at this meeting for the implementation of Phase Two of the pilot,
when a sample of students entering in September 92 will be
assessed in the areas of writing, arithmetic, and reading vocabu-
lary and comprehension. Students who do not meet basic
standards will be advised of available support services and their
progress will be compared to that of a control group. Besides
sharing its findings, the committee would like to include others
from the College in Phase Two of the project. At this meeting it
would also like to open discussion on how the College should
respond to students who are at risk.

If you are interested in improving the first year experience
of students, have an interest in this project or are merely curious,
plan to attend the Cross-College Assessment Meeting, Monday,
May 11, 1 p.m. Room H501.

Disabled Awareness Day: Audience listens to Frank
Jonasen of BCEADS.

ARC Special Needs Advisor Lucas Foss reminds
everyone to attend the first Faculty Development Day
which will deal with "Persons with Disabilities: Building
Awareness" on Monday, May 11, 9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.
North Cafeteria. "This is going to be a fun day filled with
insights and the odd ‘aha’ gleaned through interesting
talks, shared experiences, and experiential learning, and
there’s a really good video." says Lucas. " It promises to
be enlivening and rewarding. | have a hunch you will
value this day a lot," he adds.