Breaking Down Silos in Student ServicesWorking Together to Transform Assessment

Andrea Niosi, Student Affairs SLO Coordinator/Librarian - City College of San FranciscoSLO Symposium - Monterey Peninsula CollegeFebruary 7, 2020

Building Meaningful Assessments▪ Work

collectively

▪ Discover commonalities

▪ Identify themes

Factors Contributing to Academic Silos ▪ College organizational chart

▪ Offices physically spread apart

▪ Program missions independent of one another

▪ Past practice - “the way work has always been done”

(Cooper, 2015)

ReflectionCampus MapOrganizational Chart

Does your college’s org chart re- enforce silos or support collaboration? What about the layout of your campus?

Question 1

Characteristics of Siloed SSO Assessment

● Outcomes too specific and narrow

● Low response rates

● Informs unit what it already knows

● Difficult to sustain enthusiasm for assessment work

(Bratt, 2015)

MissionMISSIONProvides leadership in reviewing and refining assessment plans, timelines, and reporting methods for assessing student service outcomes in the Student Affairs Division and other student services areas.

MEMBERS▪ Faculty▪ Classified staff▪ Administrators

SSO Workgroup

Is cross-departmental dialogue occurring? If so, how?

Question 2

SSOs (as opposed to SLOs)▪ Impact on student learning is indirect

▪Often without a clear end product

▪Not within a defined period of time (ex. academic term)

▪Measuring an ongoing process is difficult

(Actuarial Solutions, 2018)

Service Area Outcomes

Describes the level of efficiency and effectiveness of a service area and its ability to serve the department’s mission and program objectives

Student Service Learning Outcomes

Describes what students are able to do after receiving services

New Outcome Model

Broader outcomes relate more closely to program missionsOverarching themes emerge

Old Outcome Model

Each of the units below had their own specific outcomes and assessments; outcomes were very specific

▪ Veterans Counseling▪ Athletic Counseling▪ Transfer Counseling▪ Career Counseling▪ International Counseling

Old outcomes couldn’t map up to broader outcomes to see overall counseling department impact

New Outcome Model▪ Broader more general outcomes

▪ Counseling units could align

▪ Didn’t specify a particular event or workshop

▪ Old outcomes became measures for broader outcomes

▪ Learning outcomes focused on ability of students to navigate services & build confidence

▪ Service outcomes focused on efficiency of providing services so students were more able to pursue their educational goal

Counseling Example

How are SSO outcomes organized and stated at your institution?

Question 3

Collaborative Assessment Process▪ Encourages group members to see the student

experience

▪ Helps to identify areas of improvement broader than within one unit

▪ Builds momentum and excitement in assessment

▪ Improves communication between departments

▪ Leads to greater levels of commitment to continuous improvement

Clusters (teams) began to formStudent Success ProgramsEOPS CalWORKS HARTS Guardian Scholars

Counseling UnitsNew Students Continuing Students Veterans Multicultural Retention Program DSPS

Direct Student Services A&R Outreach Financial Aid Scholarships Matriculation

“One of the benefits of working together has been looking at how we can eliminate barriers for our shared students. For example, we realized that CalWORKs ask for similar information that we request for our CARE students from the county. So to prevent the student from having to go through the process of having both forms completed, we decided that one joint form would be ideal. We have also found ways to strengthen referral process and have shared strategies to improve our services.Sometimes it’s as simple as seeing how one program did something and how we can do something similar for our program.”

Katrina Evasco, EOPS - CCSF

Benefits of Working Collaboratively

Identify commonalities with other departments (program missions, outcomes). What questions do you have that other programs may want answers to as well?

Question 4

Goals for Student Success Focus Groups▪ Gain student perspectives

▪ Develop and support a shared vision for all student success programs

▪ Understand program similarities and differences

▪ Envision a shared space for Student Success programs in the future (Maheshwari, 2019)

Counseling Collaboration▪ Share common data (reduce data silos)

▪ Develop common discussion points

▪ navigation of college systems and services▪ understand and pursue an educational plan▪ provide support to build confidence and

independence

▪ Work toward a common goal (student success)

Does your school conduct collaborative assessments across student service depts? Who organizes the assessment? Who is involved?

Questions 5

Benefits of Multi-department Assessment

▪ Larger number of respondents provide more validity to assessments

▪ Varied data provides a richer overall picture of division

▪ Ability to identify gaps or unique trends in one program not identified in other programs

Student Service Locations

Moving forw

ard

(Black, 2012).

Questions?

ReferencesBlack, J. (2012). Whole is greater than the sum of its parts. [Photograph]. Retrieved from https://msptelemarketing.com/2012/12/the-whole-is-greater-than-the-sum-of-the-parts/

Bratt, W. (2015). Broken pencil. [Photograph]. Retrieved from https://www.willbrattcounselling.com/blog-creating-difference/2015-10-22/what-frustration-says-about-you

Cooper, C. (2015). [#Information Development World]. Breaking Down Silos — Improving the User Experience by Improving Communication in Your Organization with Charles Cooper. [Slide Image 7]. Retrieved from https://www.slideshare.net/InfoDevWorld/breaking-down-silos-improving-the-user-experience-by-improving-communication-in-your-organization-with-charles-cooper

Actuarial Solutions (2018).I FRS 17 – square peg, round hole. [Image]. Retrieved from https://aprllp.com/ifrs-17-ifrs-4-the-limitation-game/ifrs-17-square-peg-round-hole-2/

Maheshwari, I. (2019, May 28). Focus group Vs One-On-One interview. [Image]. Retreived from https://medium.com/uxarmy/focus-groups-vs-one-on-one-interviews-when-and-why -9ad38ee16ef5