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Institutional Research & Assessment

Southern Utah University
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science
Academic Outcomes Assessment Plan
Academic Year 2001-2002

Mission Statement:

We understand that a rich and appropriate mathematics education is needed by all disciplines at Southern Utah University. Not only do we serve future mathematicians, scientists, business strategists and engineers but also future teachers of mathematics and computer science students as well as those pursuing studies in the arts and humanities. Except for reading, no other skill is so universally needed across the entire breadth of our society as those that our department is responsible to teach.

The department of mathematics and computer science is committed to offering a well-rounded academic program that will enhance the lives of both the casual observer of our discipline and the most serious minded science students. The demand for knowledge we offer is enormous in both industry and education. In secondary schools the two greatest shortages of qualified teachers across the nation are in mathematics and technology. This provides us with a great opportunity to serve both our students and the nation, and we feel that it is our mission to do so.

Goals Statement:

The department of mathematics and computer science has five specific areas of responsibility. They are:
1) General Education
2) Service courses for other departments
3) Preparing mathematics and computer science teachers for secondary schools
4) Preparing our majors for employment in industry
5) Preparing our majors for graduate school

Objectives:

1) We must offer sufficient general education courses, both in numbers of sections and in levels of proficiency expected, to accommodate the demands placed on us by student needs, student abilities, and student interests.

2) We must advise students into general education courses that will be both meaningful and manageable with the abilities and background they have.

3) We must offer the mathematical instruction that is needed and requested by the major departments we serve.

4) We are to prepare our mathematics education majors with both the mathematical knowledge and the teaching skills necessary for successful teaching careers in secondary schools.

5) We must prepare our majors for successful careers after graduation.

6) We must prepare our majors for successful admission into graduate schools.

7) We would recruit more quality students to the university and into our department.

8) We would increase our retention rate of majors and ratio of upper division students.

9) We would increase the effectiveness of our teaching.

Implementation and Assessment:

1) We offer courses that range from pre-algebra, requiring essentially no background, to courses that the most advanced entering students can find challenging, and offer them frequently enough and with enough sections that students need not be turned away from courses they need. All of our general education courses are offered every semester.

2) We look at student high school transcripts and give placement tests to acquire evidence of student background and abilities in order to properly advise them into the appropriate level of mathematics and computer science courses. The placement exams are prepared and administered by Susan Peterson and Lohra Wolden and are reviewed and updated each year.

3) Specific content requests are made by departments of business, education, and engineering for the service courses we teach to their majors. We honor those requests. We also keep abreast of that which is being done in those courses at other universities across the country to make certain that our courses are in line with that which is being done elsewhere. We have not kept a file containing the requests that have come from departments which we serve or of our responses to those requests, but will do so beginning immediately.

4) We require all of the state (level 4 mathematics endorsement requirements for the state of Utah) and nationally (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics "Standards For Teaching Mathematics") recommended subject matter and methods courses of our mathematics education majors. The mathematical knowledge is assessed through classroom testing, an exit exam, and an exit interview. Teaching effectiveness is assessed through observations and evaluations of a cooperation teacher in the secondary schools, a supervising mathematics professor, and a supervising education professor. The exit exam, a report of the exit interview, and the student teacher evaluations will be a permanent part of the students' files.

5) We require our majors to acquire skills that will make them employable upon graduation. We also require that they can demonstrate those skills not only on in-class assessments but also on a comprehensive examination before graduation and in an exit interview. As with the mathematics education majors, these will be kept in the students' files.

6) We require courses of our majors that are basic courses necessary to prepare them to do well on the GRE and to be able to enter graduate level courses and succeed in them. We plan to gather data on the success rates of former students who have chosen this option, to ask for their input and recommendations for improving that preparation, and to use this information to improve our program. Specific data we intend to keep includes: GRE scores of our graduates who take the exam, a record of those who do enter graduate school and of those who complete graduate degrees, and a file containing questionnaires that will be sent to former graduates asking for their evaluation of the education we have provided them.

7) Mathematics and computer science provide such vast career opportunities that recruitment into these areas is just a matter of informing and educating people. Recruiting them to the university can be more difficult because most colleges and universities offer majors in these areas. We can improve our effectiveness in this endeavor by having representatives at high school science fairs and career days, by sponsoring fairs and contests on our campus, and by directly approaching students, such as the sterling scholars identified by each high school in the area, who have already been chosen as gifted in mathematics and technology. To assess our effectiveness in this area we will 1) keep a record of our faculty participation in such events, 2) ask each of our new majors each year to identify their reason for coming to SUU and particularly for majoring in mathematics or computer science, and 3) keep track of the number of students that we have acquired as a result of our recruiting efforts. This can assist us in identifying the areas where we can make the best uses of our resources.

8) We can improve in this area by identifying our majors early, staying close to them by assigning each a faculty advisor in our department and being kept aware of their future plans and needs. When a student informs us of plans to leave the university the advisor will interview the student to determine the cause. A record will be kept of reasons for students leaving college or transferring to another college or university. This will help us identify weaknesses in our own program. We can also make certain that most of our courses are typical of that which is being done at other universities across the country. This will facilitate transfer of students from other colleges and universities and recruitment of upper division students.

9) We are constantly trying to improve teaching. Teacher evaluations are given each year, and are used to identify areas where improvement is needed. These areas are reviewed in an annual stewardship interview with the department chair, and plans and commitments are made for necessary changes. Sufficient time is given for those changes to be made and differences in the evaluations will be looked for the following year. This is done in a spirit of assistance rather than threat or intimidation.

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Last Update: Friday, June 06, 2003