Weber State University   

Information Systems & Technologies

Results of Assessment

2000-2001 (08/31/01)

Note:  The results of assessment for all undergraduate departments and programs within the School of Business & Economics are presented in this combined report.

Placement of Graduates

Preparing students to find meaningful employment is a fairly consistent objective across the school's four departments. The School of Accountancy's objectives include the preparation of students for "entry level accounting positions at the bachelor degree level or preparation for graduate studies." The Department of Business Administration uses the phrase "placement in positions befitting their education and with competitive salaries." The Department of Information Systems & Technologies states that it "prepares job-ready graduates." Regarding the placement of graduates, the language used by the Department of Economics notes that its graduates will "lead organizations." Presumably, the economics students will find employment within the organizations they lead.

The placement of graduates is assessed through quantitative methods. Each year, graduates are surveyed. In recent years, the School has used a national assessment instrument developed by the Educational Benchmarking Institute (hereafter EBI). Quantitative data are gathered at both the school and departmental levels. At the school level, the primary concerns are salary, employer and job title. At the department level, additional data are gathered to reflect particular interests. For example, the School of Accountancy is concerned with placement at particular public accounting firms. The Department of Economics is concerned with the placement of students in top graduates programs.

The school and departments also use a variety of qualitative methods to assess placement. These methods include individual and group interviews with students and employers. As examples, the School of Accountancy and the Department of Information Systems and Technologies hold "focus groups" with their respective advisory committees.

The quantitative data indicate that the various departments are successful in meeting their placement objectives. In 2001, two programs will have average starting salaries in excess of $40,000 and the remaining programs will have starting salaries in the mid $30s. For several years the overall placement rates have been 92 to 96 percent. This year, one program will have 100 percent placement. While we are satisfied by these results, the purpose of this report is to talk about how assessment data have produced changes within the School of Business and Economics.

While the quantitative data on placement are strong, qualitative assessments indicate room for improvement. In particular, we find:

1) our students frequently begin their job search too late,

2) our students tend to be too narrowly focused in their selection of firms and employment opportunities, and

3) often, our students do not integrate their pre-graduation employment experience with their post-graduation plans.

To address these issues, the School of Business and Economics has adopted a number of programs and practices.

The School now pays the cost of opening a placement file in the Career Services Office for those students who open a file during the first month of the academic year. During the fall term, the School hosts a program which promotes internships. As part of the Nye Lecture Series, students are coached in sound job search strategies during the first week of each term. Finally, the School has increased emphasis upon out-of-state employment.

An experimental avenue for addressing these issues is the Wall Street Fellows Program. The Wall Street Fellows Program is a unique blend of student scholarships and executive mentoring for students in the John B. Goddard School of Business and Economics. In their junior year, a select number of students will be awarded Wall Street Scholarships. Concurrently, a faculty fellow will work closely with the selected students. Finally, each student recipient will have the opportunity for personal mentoring and career coaching by the executive mentor for whom their scholarship is named. The purpose of this program is to: 1) prompt students to carefully consider career opportunities in investment banking in their junior year, 2) expand our students' horizons by making them aware of out-of-state career opportunities, and 3) to provide financial assistance which will reduce students' dependency upon income-producing employment and allow them to consider internship and other employment opportunities which will enhance their prospects for post-graduation employment. The general framework of the Wall Street Fellows program is adaptable to other programs, and the School is presently exploring a parallel program for Information Technologies majors.

Information Technology

Preparing students who are competent in the use of information technology is a common theme within the Goddard School of Business and Economics. There are significant differences with regard to precisely how each department expects its graduates to be able to use information technology. The School of Accountancy stresses the use of technology to gather and present information, and its student learning outcomes state that the School of Accountancy will prepare students who are able to use "library and computer resources both to gather and present accounting information." Similarly, the Department of Business Administration states that students will be able to "plan, organize, research and present reports using emerging technologies." The Economics Department stresses the use of information technology to analyze data and states that "each student will have experience using the computer to analyze statistical data." The Information Systems and Technologies Department, which has yet to complete more than the first step in the assessment matrix, does not list any information competencies, but one would presume that this reflects the failure to articulate a complete list of objectives rather than a denigration of the importance of information technology.

Proficiency in the use of information technology is assessed at both the school and department levels. The Department of Information Systems and Technologies' IS&T 2000 course, which is required of all business majors, assesses sophomore/junior proficiency. This year, the IS&T Department will experiment with a pre-test/post-test approach in the IS&T 2000 class. Each of the departments offers course-embedded assessment of information technology skills. A partial list of examples includes: Management 3200 (word processing and presentation software), Logistics and Operations Management 3050 (spreadsheets), and Economics 4550 (statistical software). At the school-wide level, the EBI graduation survey provides a qualitative assessment of information technology skills.

Feedback from both student and employers has produced clear changes in the way the School of Business and Economics addresses information technology. For many years, the prevalent view of the faculty was that students should learn general application software. It was believed that once a general application was mastered, students could easily learn other specific software packages of the same genre. To give a specific example, the view was that students should learn some spreadsheet application, but it was not important which spreadsheet application the students learned.

Assessment data from both students and employers indicated a strong preference for specific application software. The primary source of student data was the EBI graduation survey. Based upon the EBI survey, the area of computer proficiency was identified as an area which needs improvement. A specific instrument was designed to provide further data regarding our students computer proficiency. At the same time, employers provided feedback on our students' computer skills. The primary avenues for attaining employer feedback on our students' computer skills were the School of Accountancy Advisory Committee and the Department of Information Systems and Technologies Advisory Committee.

Specifically, we found that employers want students to be proficient in Microsoft applications rather than alternative software. Student feedback was also consistent with the view that it is important to teach Microsoft-specific software. As a result, the School of Business and Economics adopted Microsoft software as the application package for the required courses and Microsoft software was placed in the Wattis computer lab. Since making this change, results on the information technology section of the EBI survey have markedly improved.

Communication Skills

Each of the four departments within the school lists communication skills as a learning objective. The Economics Department offers perhaps the most complete statement. The Economics Department states that its graduates will: "possess strong written and oral communication skills. Every student will have prepared papers which combine numerical data with the written word. All students will have the ability to orally present their ideas and to effectively listen and glean information from the presentations of others."

The School of Accountancy is more brief, stating that "students will be able to communicate effectively both orally and in writing in professional accounting situations appropriate to their specialization." The Department of Business Administration states that "graduates will be able to demonstrate competency in both oral and/or written communication skills." The Department of Information Systems and Technologies indicates that IS&T graduates will exhibit "strong communication skills and effective team work."

Communications skills are assessed through a variety of course-embedded assessments. All business students are required to take a junior-level business communications course. The most popular course for satisfying this requirement is Management 3200. The Management 3200 course requires students to do both written and oral communication assignments. The final assignment for the course is a presentation which is videotaped. After the presentation, each student receives a one-on-one critique of the videotape. In addition, all business students are required to complete Business Administration 4780 which is an integrative, capstone course which requires students to make presentations which are assessed.

In defining the types of communication skills our students need, departments have drawn heavily upon the business community. In recent years, departments began to shift away from the model in which the members of the business community define communications skills, faculty design exercises to teach the skills, and faculty assess the skills. The emerging model is one in which members of the business community are involved in the direct assessment of communications skills. In some cases, members of the business community are actually designing exercises for students. Thus, in this case prior assessment efforts have changed the assessment methodology used.

The new model has progressed to the point where students in three of the four departments regularly make formal presentations to members of the business community, and these presentations are assessed by the business people. A few illustrative examples follow. Each of the examples given below is an example of an ongoing practice; the examples are not a singular occurrence.

• In their capstone course, teams of Information Systems and Technologies students work on a semester-long project. At the conclusion of the term, the department dedicates one meeting of their advisory committee to student presentations. The student teams make presentations to the members of the Information Systems and Technologies' Advisory Committee and students receive direct feedback from the committee members.

• In the finance program, all of the students in Finance 3300 complete a financial planning exercise.  A group of financial planning professionals critique presentations made by the students.

• Accounting students work on a tax problem developed by a Big Five accounting firm. After analyzing the problem, the students present their results to members of the accounting firm.

• Marketing students work on a problem designed by General Motors, and present their results to the company.

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