Franklin & Marshall College

Lynn Brooks

Arthur and Katherine Shadek Professor of Humanities and Dance

Although I’m K-12 certified as a teacher of dance, my own teaching career has unfolded in higher education, both in conservatory and college settings. That earlier education training, however, gave me some familiarity with assessment concepts and allowed me to work on arts-curriculum guidelines for the School District of Lancaster, where learning objectives, classroom exercises, and levels of assessment shaped our work. As a teacher in the arts, and a dedicated liberal-education advocate, I recognize that assessment is about far more than numbers, although these can be valuable. F&M’s commitment to assessment allows faculty members of each department and program to identify key elements of their curriculum for focused attention, stimulating a lively dialogue, a range of approaches, and the bubbling creativity of a vibrant, thoughtful community of teachers and learners. Working with different departments and reading a wide array of assessment literature has allowed me to recognize the benefits we can reap from good assessment, as well as to beware of the dangers of a narrow or top-down program.

Katherine McClelland

Professor of Sociology

As a sociologist, I’ve been aware of assessment in a general sense for many years now, and as a sociologist who studies education, I’ve been tracking the now-twinned movements of assessment and accountability over the last twenty years.   I teach the Methods course in our department, and thus am familiar with issues of measurement and data analysis, both quantitative (surveys and statistics) and qualitative.   I’ve informally consulted with friends and colleagues over the years on program assessment issues.   For the Sociology Department’s last external review (in the spring of 2007), I designed, fielded, and analyzed the results from a brief, emailed survey of our alumni.

Over the past several years, I’ve read a fair amount of the literature on assessment of college student learning  - both “how to” books and articles, and critiques.   Conversations with colleagues here at F&M and elsewhere have reinforced both my skepticism about some uses of assessment as well as my firm belief in its value.   I believe one of the main strengths of F&M’s approach to this critical issue is our insistence on paying attention to both.    As affirmed in the “Guiding Principles” underlying assessment of student learning at F&M, drawn up by the first cohort of Fellows and endorsed by the Provost, “the conversation matters.”   I am always happy to participate in it.   By sharing our experiences, both positive and negative, we can identify what is helpful and what is not, and use the former to help ourselves become more reflective and thereby, more effective teachers. 

Jennifer Redmann

Associate Professor of German and Russian

Foreign language education has long been shaped by a culture of assessment, including the current “proficiency orientation” which focuses on what students can actually do with a language at various levels. Over the course of the last 15 years, I have done extensive work at the course and curricular level to develop strategies that foster communicative and cultural proficiency in students. I recently co-authored a textbook, Schreiben lernen: A Writing Guide for Learners of German (Yale UP, 2011), designed to assist students in developing writing skills at all levels of the German curriculum. My assessment work also extends to the Advanced Placement program in German; for the next three years, I will work with the College Board and Educational Testing Service as Chief Reader, overseeing the scoring of the free response sections of the AP German exam each June. As an assessment fellow at Franklin & Marshall, I especially appreciate the opportunity to consider the role of assessment in a wide array of disciplines and to work with colleagues in establishing assessment practices that enhance teaching and learning at F&M. 

Marcus Thomsen

Professor of Chemistry

My participation in the Faculty Assessment Seminar in 2009 provided interesting perspectives on the nature and role of assessment for various disciplines and different pedagogies.  In 2010 and 2011 I was a member of the Organic Chemistry Examination Committee: Division of Chemical Education of the American Chemical Society.  The committee was charged with developing a new standardized test that colleges and universities may use to assess learning in the yearlong organic chemistry course sequence.  As an assessment fellow, I look forward to working with colleagues in other disciplines as they develop and implement assessment practices at the College.

Krista Casler

Associate Professor of Psychology

Misty Bastian

Professor of Anthropology

Rob Jinks

Associate Professor of Biology

Stephan Käufer

Professor of Philosophy

Christy LaRochelle

Associate Professor of Physics

Mary Ann Levine 

Associate Professor of Anthropology

Richard Moog

Professor of Chemistry

Alan Caniglia

Senior Associate Dean of the Faculty and Vice Provost for Planning and Institutional Research