Category: CRG Stories

4-VA@Mason Awards Funding for 12 Promising Investigations Led by Mason Faculty plus Eight Additional Collaborations for Mason Co-PIs

4-VA@Mason, announces the Collaborative Research Awards for the 23-24 academic year — with 12 projects spearheaded by Mason faculty, and eight for Mason faculty acting as Co-PIs. “These 4-VA@Mason Collaborative Research Grants are the core of what our state program is all about — providing seed funding to encourage faculty from our eight partner schools to launch novel research efforts and build critical relationships among the institutions,” said Janette Kenner Muir, Vice Provost, Academic Affairs and Campus Coordinator of 4-VA@Mason.

Approved proposals were from a range of colleges at Mason including the College of Visual and Performing Arts, Computer Game Design/Virginia Serious Game Institute; the College of Humanities and Social Sciences; the College of Engineering and Computing; and the College of Science.

One proposal funded this year is Dr. Chris Jones’ work, Using Taxonomic, Pigment, and Molecular Analysis to Characterize Algal Blooms in the Shenandoah River. Professor Jones, a member of the Environmental Science & Policy Department and Director of the Potomac Environmental Research and Education Center, has already seen the benefit of 4-VA support with growing research projects focused on harmful algal blooms that threaten Virginia’s Shenandoah River and also plague waters throughout the world. In the Shenandoah, these blooms originally consisted of green algae, which while troublesome for recreational activities, did not present a danger to humans and wildlife. In the past two years, however, the blooms have included cyanobacteria that contain toxins. Environmental engineers recognize that it is critical to identify the toxic bacteria quickly and definitively, but current methodologies are inadequate. Jones’ team of Mason faculty and students, together with their partners at Old Dominion University, will tackle this important challenge.

The following are the 4-VA@Mason 2023-24 Collaborative Research Grant winners, with partner schools in parentheses.

Akerlof, Karen Bridging Science and Policy in the States: A Study of Emerging Mechanisms to Train Scientists and Engineers (VT)
Enfield, Jacob MySQL Murder Mystery (VMI)
Furst, Kirin Emlet The role of the air-water interface in breakthrough of PFAS and phthalate esters during wastewater treatment (VT)
Jones, R Christian Using Taxonomic, Pigment and Molecular Analysis to Characterize Algal Blooms in the Shenandoah River (ODU)
Kang, Pilgyu Machine learning assisted laser manufacturing of alloy nanoparticle graphene hybrid materials for high performance hydrogen sensing (UVA)
LaFrance, Michelle The Virginia Community and Public Writing Collaborative (JMU, VCU, VT, UVA)
Lawrence, Heidi A Rhetorical Approach to Challenges in Blood Donation (VT)
Raffegeau, Tiphanie Using Virtual Reality to Study Cognitive and Affective Risk Factors for Falls in Older Adults (ODU)
Straus, David The Role of Diabatic Heating in Determining Atlantic Storm Paths (UVA)
Van Aken, Benoit Protection of RNA by Association with Macromolecules Implications for Wastewater Based Epidemiology (VT)
Yu, Yun Nanoscale Visualization of Electrocatalytic Carbon Dioxide Reduction Activity at Cu Nanocatalysts (UVA)
Zhu, Ziwei Towards Consolidated and Dynamic Debiasing for Online Search and Recommendation (VT)

The following Mason faculty received funding as Co-PIs collaborating with other 4-VA institutions in parentheses:

Chowdhury, Ahsan The Commonwealth Proofs Project Collaborative: Promoting Students’ Understanding of Logical Implications and their Transformations (VT)
Dromgold-Sermen, Michelle New American Resources: Partnerships and Initiatives at Virginia Higher Education Institutions to Strengthen Virginia’s Migration Support (VT)
Jing, Hao Acoustics-enabled Noncontact Manipulation, Patterning, and Assembly of Complex-shaped Micro/nanoparticles for Advance Manufacturing (VT)
LaToza, Thomas Visualizing Code Changes to Understand Students’ Mental Models in Programming Education at Scale (VT)
Stone, Victoria Increasing Mental Health Services in K-12 Settings by Helping Provisionally Licensed School Counselors Meet the Requirements for Full Licensure as Professional School Counselors in Virginia (JMU)
Stone, Victoria Supporting K-12 Students after Psychiatric Hospitalizations: Piloting Mixed Reality Simulation Training for School Mental Health Professionals (UVA)
Van Aken, Benoit Hyperspectral imaging for the real-time detection of microplastic particles in seafoods (VT)
Zhu, Ziwei Break the Dilemmas between Model Performance and Fairness: A Holistic Solution for Fairness Learning on Graphs (VT)

“We are looking forward to the new discoveries we will find with these 4-VA collaborative projects,” comments Vice Provost Muir, “Our faculty, students, and the Commonwealth of Virginia will benefit from these partnerships as the schools approach the work from their own perspectives and strengths, building solid partnerships for future initiatives.”

Best Practices for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Identified and Shared Statewide

Effective teaching is a cornerstone of Virginia higher education. To attain that critical bar, it is essential that successful teaching strategies are created and maintained, and that they meet students’ needs. This necessitates classroom-based research — known as the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL). Faculty-focused SoTL research achieves multiple objectives including identifying best practices in educational strategies for a specific field and promoting a university’s overall teaching excellence.

While SoTL is crucial to gain a greater understanding of what works and what doesn’t work in the classroom, very few faculty are prepared to conduct such research independently. Thus, support for SoTL frequently falls to campus Centers for Teaching and Learning (CTLs). CTLs are generally small and tasked with a wide range of faculty assistance, so identifying appropriate SoTL strategies presents a time and resource challenge.

This dilemma faced the Stearns Center at Mason as well as three other 4-VA schools — Virginia Commonwealth University, Virginia Tech, and the University of Virginia. Each wanted to address the SoTL gap. The solution was recognized via a 4-VA Collaborative Research Grant, allowing the schools to work together to create sustainable SoTL programming. The goal was to create or refine plans for engaging and supporting faculty in SoTL at their specific institutions, to develop and investigate the impact of cross-institutional support programming for faculty developers, and ultimately improve the research competitiveness of faculty at each institution. Although not part of the 4-VA partnership, the prospect of such work also attracted the attention of faculty at Mary Washington University who were interested in joining the effort.

Led by the Stearns Center for Teaching and Learning Director, Shelley Reid, with key support from Mason graduate assistant Sophia Abbot, the team represented a state-wide effort, including Ed Brantmeier, Interim Executive Director/Assistant Director of the Center for Faculty Innovation (JMU); Dayna Henry Assistant Director of the Scholarship Area at the Center for Faculty Innovation (JMU); Kim Case, Director of Faculty Success (VCU); Kim Filer, Associate Vice Provost for Faculty Development/Director of the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (VT); Lindsay Wheeler, Assistant Director of STEM Education Initiatives at the Center for Teaching Excellence and Jessica Taggart, Postdoctoral Research Associate (UVA); and Melissa Wells, Assistant Professor/Faculty Fellow of the Center for Teaching (Mary Washington). “Through our 4-VA@Mason grant, as well as the Complementary Grants at our 4-VA partner schools, we saw an opportunity to help CTLs avoid ‘reinventing the wheel’ in a key area of faculty support,” explained Reid. “SoTL is a growth area for CTLs, and this grant provided an opportunity to design that growth intentionally and collaboratively—and then to share the model with other CTLs nationally.”

Together, the group researched and built effective support structures for SoTL training. As a “community of practice,” the group met regularly to exchange strategies already in use and constructed additional strategies and resources for both CTL leaders and faculty. Next, they developed and presented workshops for national and local audiences to guide other CTL leaders in building collaborative structures. At these workshops, attendees learned about evidence-based models, common SoTL support programming across institution types, and received peer feedback on their plans. Presentations were made at the Professional & Organizational Development in Higher Education Network Conference, the International Consortium for Educational Development, the Innovations in Teaching and Learning Conference (Mason), the International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy (VT), and an online workshop for SCHEV (VCU).

Next, the team created online resources, an open access trove of tools for SoTL developers, including a Taxonomy of common language and organizational structure for understanding a variety of SoTL program models — organized by program type with a detailed description of each model. It also includes examples to further support readers’ envisioning of program possibilities. Further, visitors can access a strategic plan worksheet, which guides SoTL developers through the details of their aspirational and future plans in the context of their institution and provides a venue to receive peer feedback on specific aspects of their plan.

The group continues to spread the word about effective SoTL practices through the following publications:

International Journal of Academic Development Impact of a Regional Community of Practice for Academic Developers Engaged in Institution-Level Support for SoTL (Lukes, Abbot, Henry, Wells, Baum, Case, Brantmeier, & Wheeler)
To Improve the Academy Strategic Planning Tools for Educational Developers Supporting SoTL Cultures and Programs at their Institutions (Lukes, Abbot, Wheeler, Henry, Case, Wells, Brantmeier)
New Directions for Teaching and Learning Examining a Regional Educational Developer Community of Practice for Advancing Institutional Cultures of SoTL Engagement (Abbot, Lukes, Baum, Case, Henry, Brantmeier, Wheeler)

“Our team members have been particularly excited about the positive reception of the collaborative model through the well-attended national workshops. We’re looking forward to the conversations that are made possible through the multiple publications that will increase our audience and enable other CTLs to build their own collaborations.” concludes Reid.

Communication Across the Curriculum: Developing Faculty Resources to Enhance Student Success

Communication competency is recognized as one of the most important skills for a successful college and professional career. To support this outcome, writing courses have long been a requirement in higher education to bolster communication proficiency. More recently, additional efforts have been developed to provide students with a larger framework, including the creation of Communication Centers on college campuses — rising from a grassroots movement in the 1980s to a more defined role in the early 2000s.

Today, colleges recognize the need for further multiple, scaffolded opportunities to practice language and presentation skills throughout a student’s academic lifespan. This includes learning oral and written skills found within their chosen career track. Such an approach, known as communication across the curriculum (CxC), enhances opportunities for students to both strengthen their communication abilities and to employ in-depth content area specifics. Regrettably, however, many subject matter faculty feel ill-equipped and unsupported in their efforts to integrate communication into course curricula, expressing a need for more teaching assistance to provide student feedback on a range of communication skills — presentations, team projects, interpersonal skills — within the course framework.

Mason’s Melissa Broeckelman-Post, Professor and the Basic Course Director in the Department of Communication saw a need to intervene. This thinking was shared by Broeckelman-Post’s colleagues at two other 4-VA partner schools — Virginia Tech’s Director of Undergraduate Programs and Senior Instructor in the School of Communication Brandi Quesenberry, and JMU’s Associate Professor in the School of Communication Studies and Basic Course Director Timothy Ball. They had connected at previous conferences and were sharing ideas on CxC but saw a 4-VA grant as an opportunity to concretely collaborate on scholarship that would be helpful for all institutions.

Together, they wanted to look more closely at what would be needed to develop a CxC program at each of their schools. It was the 4-VA Collaborative Research Grant that allowed them to begin this important work.

“We knew that faculty members would greatly benefit with tools and techniques to provide their students feedback on the range of communication skills within their disciplines, including oral, written, team building, intercultural, and leadership,” explains Broeckelman-Post. “The first step in our plan was to reach out to Stephanie Norander, Executive Director of one of the nation’s leading CxC programs at University of North Carolina at Charlotte, to ensure that we utilize the best practices in building resources that will be effective for faculty on our campuses.”

From there, Broeckelman-Post, Quesenberry and Ball, assembled a team of graduate students at Mason, (Adebanke Adebayo, Aayushi Hingle, Lane Schwager, Shannon Taylor Heflin, Briana Stewart, and Sammi Tuckerman Munson) Virginia Tech (Emma Baumgardner) and JMU (Selim Njeim). Their goal was to create a robust set of flexible tools to support faculty and student learning, including online resources, individual and small group faculty curriculum consultations, and in-class workshops to help faculty embed communication skills development within their disciplinary courses that can be shared across the institutions.

Before they began, the CxC team needed a greater understanding of just what faculty in a variety of disciplines perceived as important communication skills and what they believed to be helpful for their courses. Three research question were developed:

RQ1: How do faculty across disciplines perceive and value communication?
RQ2: What types of support do faculty across disciplines need to incorporate communication assignments in their classes?
RQ3: What are the most important communication skills employers across disciplines are seeking?

Faculty at all three universities were invited to join in an online study, with 232 accepting the offer. Participants represented a wide range of departments, including the social sciences, engineering and computing, health and human services, business and interdisciplinary or unspecified areas. Through the survey, a greater insight as to what aspects of communication that were important to faculty and for student’s careers was established. Notes Quesenberry, “While the results pointed us to the development of concrete communications packages, we were struck by the fact that 93.2% of all faculty identified communication as “extremely important” or “very important” to their major’s discipline.” The CxC team knew that their work was needed.

A comprehensive overview of the faculty research survey was recently published in Communication Education, with all team members who contributed to the research component of the project receiving authorship credit. Another goal of the project was to create a website with communication resources for faculty across disciplines. This robust site is now populated with a broad variety of tools to assist faculty to aid students with a range of projects including designing oral presentations, presentation performance and delivery, adapting presentations for audiences, and interviews: https://4va.gmu.edu/communication-across-the-curriculum-resources/.

The findings were shared at two different presentations at the National Communication Association annual convention. They now plan presentations at additional local conferences including Mason’s Innovations in Teaching and Learning.

“Thanks to this collaboration, we were able to develop some important tools to build effective CxC programs at all three of our universities,” notes Ball. “That’s a win for Virginia’s faculty and students.”

Five 4-VA Schools Collaborate to Better Understand the History of Higher Education

The Council for the Advancement of Standards in Higher Education lists the History of Higher Education as an important core course that provides students the opportunity to bridge practice and theory. However, the class is rarely taught by historians and often lacks a focus on the historical thinking, research, and digital literacy skills necessary for a clear-eyed understanding of the higher education landscape.

This dilemma was on the mind of historian Kelly Schrum, Professor, Higher Education Program, and Affiliated Faculty in the Department of History and Art History at Mason. It also concerned her colleague in the Higher Education Program at Virginia Tech, Assistant Professor, Chase Catalano. Together, via an initial 4-VA Collaborative Research Grant in 2020-2021, they wanted to integrate those missing skills into the class with the hope of increasing research opportunities and creating a valuable open educational resource (OER).

The project, launched during the pandemic, consisted of students at Mason and VT working together and in parallel to learn about the history of higher education while developing historical thinking and research skills.

The project was a great success. “The student-created asynchronous learning activity assignment worked very well, and fostered a true collaboration across our institutions,” said Schrum. In addition to the learning activity assignments, students and faculty contributed to a website, higheredhistory.gmu.edu; piloted a primary source learning activity in two different higher education graduate courses during Fall 2020; and expanded the project to a third course in Spring 2021.

Schrum, Catalano, and Sophia Abbot, a doctoral student at Mason, grew this work into a larger research project on teaching and learning the history of higher education. Thirty-five students agreed to share their work for analysis and 24 were interviewed after completing the course. The survey and interview data made clear that students appreciated the value and relevance of studying the history of higher education for both their curricular and professional goals. One student explained, “We were able to take what we learned in the course and apply it to the project in a way that was very effortless, and that really helped me think about history in a different way.”

The group presented their initial findings at the Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy in February 2021 which were very well received. They then began talking with colleagues around the commonwealth at William & Mary, James Madison University, and Old Dominion University. Their shared interest in improving history of higher education courses prompted Schrum to apply for an extension and expansion of the Collaborative Research Grant. Schrum’s co-PIs at the partner schools requested 4-VA Complementary Grants at their institutions allowing continued work together with a wider lens.

The expansion grant enlarged the initial team to include Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education Ben Boone of W&M; Art Dean, Executive Director for Access and Inclusion, JMU; Kim Bullington, ODU’s Adjunct Assistant Professor, Educational Foundations and Leadership; and ODU’s Director of Community Outreach & Engagement, Bill Nuckols.

In addition to Abbot, key Mason student scholars on the project included graduate students Allison Loughry and Alicia Ellis, and undergrads Sodaba Azamy and Kelly Tcheou. These students contributed to research, website development, and publications.

The 4-VA extension grant had four key components: 1) collaborate with 4-VA institutions to improve teaching and learning about the history of higher education, and to teach a shared digital assignment;2) expand OER resources on the history of higher education in the United States to provide primary sources, secondary sources, and a database of college and university archives; 3) conduct research on how the history of higher education is taught nationally; and 4) conduct Scholarship of Teaching and Learning research on how students learn historical thinking skills and digital skills as they create asynchronous learning activities on this subject.

With the expansion grant in hand, the Mason, Tech, W&M, and JMU faculty members taught the shared assignment in Fall 2021. Students also explored asynchronous primary source learning activities created by students at all four institutions. ODU taught the shared assignment in Summer 2022. Students at ODU explored primary source learning activities created by students at the other institutions and then developed additional resources which will be shared across institutions in future semesters. Between the five institutions, more than 100 students built individual asynchronous primary source learning activities. Selected activities are publicly available at https://sites.google.com/view/history-of-higher-ed/learning-activities-examples.

Explains Abbot, “I developed countless skills while collaborating on this project: from deepening my own understanding of the history of higher education and the value of primary sources, to engaging students in authentic, student-driven, project-based assignments. I’ve been inspired by the historical research students have done through this cross-institutional assignment, especially on Virginia institutions—uncovering stories that are rarely told in commonly assigned texts and expanding their understanding of the colleges and universities within which they operate,”

Each school contributed OER materials for the website. In addition to primary and secondary sources, the website now contains a database of institutional archives with digitized content, including yearbooks. Thanks to the two undergraduate research assistants, Azamy and Tcheo, over 700 institutional archives were cataloged on the site, including 48 Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs), 24 historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), and 15 women’s colleges. Additionally, the list includes 63 community colleges which is especially important given the lack of attention to these institutions historically.

Azamy and Tcheo have also reviewed and analyzed 70 course syllabi submitted by History of Higher Education instructors across the U.S. They prepared a summary report of common readings and course topics. Their findings supported several academic articles now underway addressing how these courses are typically structured and taught. Their work, along with that of Loughry, also supported a grant proposal submitted to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) Institute for Higher Education Faculty program.

The team credits the 4-VA grant for allowing members to do the diligent research necessary to create these important resources.

“This 4-VA project fostered meaningful and lasting collaboration across five Virginia institutions. While each university approached the history of higher education course from its own perspective, we were able to work together on a shared assignment that allowed for a rich learning experience among faculty and students across campuses. The results speak for themselves!” – Kelly Schrum, Professor, Higher Education Program, Affiliated Faculty, History and Art History, Mason

“I sincerely appreciated having an opportunity to collaborate with colleagues across the state for this 4-VA project. Through our conversations and research, I developed new pedagogical approaches that benefited students and deepened my thinking about the history of higher education.”
– Chase Catalano, Assistant Professor, Higher Education, VT

“We really enjoyed being part of this effort to expand student research on the history of higher education. Everyone came away from this project with a deeper understanding of how important it is to develop critical thinking skills and to look beyond our own institutions.”
– Ben Boone, Assistant Dean for Undergraduate Education, W&M

“The website, which holds a treasure trove of student research and engagement from a wide range of institutions, will be invaluable as we move ahead in studying the complex and influential histories of American higher education.”
– Art Dean, Executive Director for Access, and Inclusion, JMU

“When this asynchronous learning project was first introduced to the students, they were thrilled at the thought of not having to write a 20-page paper, however in the end, they did more work doing research on their chosen subject. They enjoyed this project because it allowed them a space for research and reflection, and it taught them how to create an interactive learning environment in an asynchronous environment. Being able to evaluate and participate in the projects created by other students in other universities across Virginia also taught them about their peers’ projects, too.”
– Kim Bullington, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Educational Foundations and Leadership, ODU

Outcomes:

Scholarly Conference Presentations

Catalano, C. & Hernandez, R. (2022, March). Why do we teach history? Instructor and student perspectives. ACPA-College Student Educators Conference, St. Louis, MO, United States.

Schrum, K., Abbot, S., & Catalano, C. (2022, January 6-9). History of Higher Education: Students Making Sense of Primary Sources by Designing Asynchronous Learning Activities [Poster]. American Historical Association, New Orleans, LA, United States.

Abbot, S., Schrum, K., & Catalano, C. (2021, November 13-15). Teaching Historical Thinking to Higher Education Graduate Students [Poster]. Southern Association for College Student Affairs, Norfolk, VA, United States.

Abbot, S., Schrum, K., Hernandez, R., Fong, W. L., & Loughry, A. (2021, October 26-29). Designing Digital Activities for Authentic Learning [Panel, Virtual]. International Society for the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Conference.

Schrum, K. & Abbot, S. (2021, September 20-24). On-Demand: Engaging students online through a peer-to-peer asynchronous teaching assignment [On-Demand Presentation, Virtual]. Innovations in Teaching and Learning, Fairfax, VA, United States.

Abbot, S. (2021, September 20-24). SoTL Showcase [Panel, Virtual]. Innovations in Teaching and Learning, Fairfax, VA, United States.

Abbot, S., Schrum, K., & Catalano, C. (2021, February 3-5). Graduate Students Learning and Teaching History through Asynchronous Activities [Poster session, virtual]. Conference on Higher Education Pedagogy, Blacksburg, VA, United States.

Publications

Catalano, D., Schrum, K., Fay, E., & Abbot, S. (forthcoming, 2023). ‘I can learn from the past’: Making the history of higher education relevant through social justice education pedagogy. The History Teacher.

Loughry, A., Abbot, S., Schrum, K., & Catalano, D. (forthcoming 2023). Developing digital skills through a student-facilitated asynchronous learning activity. The Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy.

Schrum, K., Abbot, S., Loughry, A., & Catalano, D. (forthcoming 2024). “I wanted to know!”: Engaging learners in the history of higher education through an authentic digital assessment. The History Teacher.

Schrum, K, Abbot, S., Fay, E., Loughry, A., & Catalano, C. (in process). Teaching historical thinking through the history of higher education.

External Funding

“Unpacking the History of Higher Education in the United States.”
National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) Institute for Higher Education Faculty award.

Provost’s Graduate Student Travel Grant (January 2022)
American Historical Association Travel Grant (January 2022)
Southern Association of College Student Affairs Travel Grant (November 2021)

Mason team joins with Virginia Tech on Concrete Research for Infrastructure Security

While modern weapon makers churn out more powerful artillery creating concern about infrastructure security, civil engineers are working to construct safer and more durably designed buildings to protect society. To that end, one such development is a new form of concrete known as high-performance fiber reinforced concrete (HP-FRC). It is believed that this adaptation of concrete could be critical in the field of protective design specifically regarding ballistic impact. However, as this material is still new to the industry there is little understanding about just how it can withstand high impact blast loads.

The lack of data regarding how HP-FRC stands up to blasts got Mason’s Associate Professor Girum Urgessa thinking. Urgessa, teaching in the Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering (CEIE) explains, “Here at Mason, we’ve studied the modeling aspect of the penetration mechanics, but our verification capability is limited because of the scarcity of experimental data.” However, Urgessa saw a perfect match for research collaboration with Eric Jacques, Assistant Professor in the Structural Engineering & Materials Group at Virginia Tech. There, Jacques can access the Thomas Murray Structures Laboratory, equipped with a large-scale gas-detonation blast simulator.

The collaboration came to fruition via Urgessa’s 4-VA@Mason grant Scaled-testing of Projectile Penetration in Conventional and High-Strength Concrete Targets. In addition to Urgessa and Jacques on the project, Mason faculty member Dhafer Marzougui and graduate student Geoffrey Dilg volunteered their time assisting with post-test computational modeling. Undergraduate student Shima Abdel Monem Awwad also worked on the project. The project team got started, building 15 small-scale fiber-reinforced concrete targets of varying thicknesses. These were built at Tech for ballistic experiments using a light gas gun.

Four HP-FRC specimens were subjected to ballistic projectile impact loading, which provided the ability to model/predict projectile penetration depths across a variety of concrete strengths and types. Says Urgessa, “Three out of four initial trials provided us with complete projectile perforation, while the third trial resulted in spalling, penetration, and radial cracking.” Although they were able to conclude that the Cem-FIL glass fibers helped reduce the effects of the cracking by holding the sections together, they did not stop the projectile from perforating. In the cases where the projectile perforated through the specimen, the fibers had either pulled out of the concrete or ruptured at most crack locations.

“Overall, this experiment proved to be very successful and has given us the opportunity to shed light on a relatively new material and that has a variety of real-world applications,” concluded Urgessa.

4-VA Grant Brings Virginia Education Assessment Professionals Together for a “Virtual Drive In”

In the largest and most widespread event that 4-VA has ever coordinated – including all six 4-VA partner schools — higher education assessment professionals from across the Commonwealth came together for a “virtual” meeting. The meeting took place in April using telepresence technology at each of the 4-VA schools.

Mason coordinator Stephanie Foster, Associate Director in the Office of Undergraduate Education, and her colleagues at the Virginia Assessment Group applied for and received a 4-VA grant to bring together assessment professionals from two- and four-year public schools, private schools, as well as alternative higher education institutions to offer advanced training for faculty and professionals who have responsibility for learning outcomes assessments in their institutions. Says Foster, “The idea for the drive-in came from a self-study of the Virginia Assessment Group’s professional development offerings. We wanted to increase participation for our community college colleagues, and travel cost was identified as a barrier to their participation. One of our board members had an idea to use the 4-VA telepresence technology to host a virtual workshop. Because it was a free event, and no participant needed to travel more than an hour to get to their closest 4-VA site, the Virtual Drive-in served a wider audience.”

The all-day workshop provided critical training on best practices in data collection, analysis, and reporting. Facilitators at each location oversaw collaborative activities to encourage partnership and sharing of innovative practices. “Telling our stories: Using assessment data for learning and improvement” was an instant success, with 168 conference registrants representing 50 organizations: 31 universities, 15 community colleges, and 4 professional organizations. The event was funded by a 4- VA Collaborative Research Grant and organized by the nonprofit Virginia Assessment Group.

Says Foster, “Good assessment is essential to our practice as educators, and many programs are doing it well. Across the field, we are striving to improve how we share what we learn with faculty and institutional leaders so that assessment work can contribute to improving curriculum and instruction for student success.”

The day-long conference agenda involved input from each of the six locations. The conference began with a welcome from the Virginia Assessment Group president, Ryan Otto (Roanoke College) at the Virginia Tech location, and review of agenda by Kelsey Kirland from Old Dominion University. The morning workshop was presented by James Madison University Assessment and Measurement doctoral students, Andrea Pope and Caroline Prendergast; Psychological Sciences master’s student, Morgan Crewe; and JMU faculty member, S. Jeanne Horst. The morning workshop, entitled “Can we back up that claim? Making important data collection design decisions” addressed the appropriate inferences that can be drawn from assessment data collection designs. The workshop began with a description of the gold standard, randomized control trial, followed by a “let’s get real” section highlighting the real-world data collection challenges that assessment practitioners face. Participants grappled with how to make appropriate inferences from the data collection designs that are possible given common constraints. The morning concluded with participants from each location providing suggestions for ways of dealing with practical challenges related to data collection.

The afternoon workshop, entitled “Evidence-based storytelling,” was facilitated by Jodi Fisler (State Council of Higher Education for Virginia), and Gianina Baker (National Institute for Learning Outcomes Assessment – NILOA). Participants viewed a video produced by Jillian Kinzie (NILOA), illustrating examples and rationale for presenting assessment findings that tell the story of student learning. Participants engaged in an activity in which they tailored a data report to a particular stakeholder audience. Gianina Baker closed the afternoon, providing reflections and suggestions for effective evidence-based reporting.

It was clear throughout the day, that connections were being made at the individual sites, and also from site to site. Attendee Adrienne E. Sullivan, Director of Accreditation in the College of Education and Human Development at Mason put it this way, “For me, the opportunity to meet and chat with other colleagues from Mason was great. (But) The highlight was to meet colleagues from other local higher education institutions and learn how they implement and handle assessment data collection was really fabulous. It made me feel that we are not alone in the struggle to find an efficient way to collect data!”

Written with contributions from S. Jeanne Horst, JMU. and Stephanie Foster, Mason. Photo credit: Kim Reedy, JMU