Although the academic programs of the School have been in existence for many years, the School, as an organizational unit is three years old. The School continues to seek both internal and external feedback that will improve the overall efforts to prepare graduates for the future.

New faculty hires as program coordinators for Athletic Training, Sports Administration and Physical Education and Sport Sciences have occurred in the last two years. This has

brought new perspectives and the opportunity to review current practices and evaluate future needs as the School implements changes.

The School of Recreation and Sport Sciences, the largest of the six schools of the College, offers a wide variety of programs at the undergraduate and masters degree levels.

Athletic Training/Exercise Physiology

Athletic Training/Health Education

Adventure Recreation

Outdoor Education and Camping

Recreation Management

Special Interests

Therapeutic Recreation

Aquatic Management

Coaching

Exercise Physiology

Sport Industry

Sport for Special Populations

Youth Sports

Athletic Administration

Athletic Training

Foundations of Teaching and Coaching

Physical Education

Recreation Studies

Sport Physiology and Adult Fitness

Two undergraduate programs have external accrediting bodies. The athletic training program is accredited by the National Athletic Trainers’ Association (NATA). Graduates of the program are eligible to take the Board of Certification examination. The physical education program submitted a portfolio rejoinder spring quarter for accreditation by the National Council on Accreditation for Teacher Education (NCATE). These students must also pass the National Teachers Exam (NTE) before they can obtain Ohio teaching certification.

The faculty held a retreat just prior to the beginning of the 1996-97 academic year to review the assessment efforts and resulting data. During this past year of assessment activities, the faculty engaged in constructive dialogue about student learning, courses, curriculum, and expected student outcomes. This proved to be a valuable process as faculty work collectively to offer programs that prepare students to be competitive in the job market and to pursue further study.

Some of the assessment measures were already in place and appeared to be effective. Others needed modification or revision and for some objectives, new measures or indicators needed to be identified and developed. This work took place throughout the year.

Over the course of the year available data were reviewed and some of the revised and new measures were implemented. In some areas, follow-up data collection will take place over the summer. Some aspects of ongoing outcomes assessment were discussed monthly at faculty meetings held by the director or program coordinators. Each program identified earlier in this report submitted individual reports by program addressing areas 1-6 requested for this year’s outcomes assessment report. The following is a narrative summary of this year’s assessment activities from these sources.

Goals identified in the first year were not modified for this year’s report. Given that some data were gathered over the summer and that there was only one year’s worth of data to work with, it was believed to be in the best interest of the process not to make a change after just one year. The following report utilizes examples of current assessment practices within degree programs used across the School.

Each end of program objective will be introduced in this next section. The discussion will include the (1) objective; (2) how student learning was assessed, test instruments, and modifications from last year; (3) strengths and weaknesses from data analysis; (4) accomplishments; and (5) improvements/enhancements/developments implemented, as appropriate. The conclusion of the report will discuss (6) the School’s recommendations for the future.

All undergraduate and graduate programs require some level of experiential field based learning through practica, internship, coaching and student teaching opportunities. Forms used to solicit feedback from preceptors were developed, where none had existed, or updated to evaluate specific knowledge of the field, decision making, communication, interpersonal skills and professional behavior competencies. Responses from these forms were compiled to establish positive or negative trends that may have programmatic or educational implications.

Further evidence of meeting program competencies can be measured by the result of external certification requiring a national standardized exam. Although some are not required, many students seeking employment in their respective professions take one of the following exams. Student teachers must take the National Teachers Exam (NTE) to be certified to teach in the public schools. All students who took the test were certified. Students going into therapeutic recreation can take the National Council for Therapeutic Recreation Certification Exam in November of each year. Last year’s class scored at or slightly above the national norm. All students who took the Exercise Leader Certification Exam through the American College of Sports Medicine passed, but we do not have comparison data against the national norm. All 18 graduating seniors passed the National Board Exam for Athletic Trainers of National Athletic Trainers’ Association within one year of graduation at or slightly above the national norm.

At the graduate level the Master of Science in Physical Education- Sport Physiology and Adult Fitness Program administered a comprehensive exam to all students during finals week as a pilot program. The exam required both written and skill evaluation of expected end of program competencies of student learning.

A new Advisory Board was identified for Sports Administration and an Alumni Sport Summit was held in Orlando in September. Over 50 alumni attended and identified goals and made recommendations to the program coordinator. Action on the school’s part is listed under Implementation.

One years’ worth of data from preceptors has not yet provided a dependable sample that might result in some program modifications although preceptors have been generally very positive about the quality of student and work performance at this time.

Due to the diversity of programs and majors, no exam exists that would allow a comparison of all graduates to any one national exam. The NTE is the only required exam that is a condition of employment in the public schools. Some employers may require specific certifications as qualifications for a position but there is not a standard expectation in each field. In some cases the reporting of exam scores are only made available to the student and the School is dependent upon their self-reporting to determine their success.

All undergraduate students who took national standardized exams passed at or above the national norm of their respective certifications. All 24 masters students in Athletic Training passed the National Athletic Trainers’ Association Board of Certification Exam (NATA) and the State of Ohio licensure exam for Athletic Trainers.

The results of the pilot comprehensive exam in Sport Physiology and Adult Fitness indicate a need to increase student learning opportunities in reading and interpreting electrocardiograms. Appropriate revisions of curriculum and student assignments for some courses have been made to correct this content area for student improvement. Results will be available for next year’s report.

For many of the field based learning experiences students were simply given an "A" by the preceptor because they completed the internship, or because preceptors felt uncomfortable assigning or discriminating between grades for what they felt was a work assignment. We have gone to an all CR grade for these assignments and developed a competency based evaluation form that each supervisor now fills out and reviews with the student. The identified competency levels are then reviewed to determine if corresponding course content issues need to be reassessed to improve the students efforts. It also becomes part of their permanent file to serve for a future job reference or database analysis. See Appendix A.

The Sports Administration Advisory Board encouraged additional courses in sports marketing and promotion, product licensing, and for the sports law course that has been an elective be added to the core curriculum. Three courses were added to requirements and two new courses were offered experimentally. They also recommended changes to the alumni newsletter and mentoring activities with current students that have been implemented for next year.

Based on last year’s exit interviews with exercise physiology graduate and undergraduate students, and in an effort to further assess students skills in exercise physiology, the School applied for and was accepted as a host site for the Certification Exam by the National Strength and Conditioning Association. Over 40 majors took the exam this past May, however, results were not yet available for this report.

This is an area that continues to need attention. Faculty have identified courses that have intensive writing components in the course requirements but have not effectively identified tools for measuring written or verbal skills for each program area. Other than the NATA exam that has a specific verbal and written components, and feedback from preceptors who are asked to evaluate written and oral communication skills as a part of the evaluation forms submitted at the conclusion of internship experiences discussed below in Accomplishments, little more has been implemented for assessing writing skills.

Students in Physical Education and Sport Sciences are being videotaped in PESS 212, 640, 333/335 and 434 during practice teaching units and conducting peer observation and peer evaluation of other students. Students are then asked to critique what they have seen, heard and understood about the instruction or directions given. They provide feedback to peers and also use the videotapes for self evaluation.

Athletic Training utilizes quarterly evaluations modeled after the NATA exam that require oral and skill assessment. This reinforces critical areas of injury management and care and provides immediate feedback to the faculty evaluators that relate to course content and lectures on the specific anatomical areas being treated. A check sheet of criteria is included in the Appendix B.

Utilizing preceptors to provide communication feedback gives a wide variety of assessments of what may be acceptable levels of communication on the part of students. This level may or may not be that which is desired by the School, but is a limitation that cannot be resolved at this time.

Increased scores for the oral and written components on the NATA exam compared to last year’s scores and this year’s national norms is a good indication that the quarterly evaluations are an effective teaching/learning tool for Athletic Trainers.

At this time there is no coordination of efforts to measure either effect or improvement on instruction from video taping presentations, but the school is developing a tool to track student performance in the series of classes to determine if teaching skills improve as students move through the series of courses.

Preceptor feedback for one year indicated most students satisfactorily meet communication expectations at the placement site. On a scale of 1-4, with 4 being desirable, preceptors rated 80% of the students at 3 or above.

The Center for Teaching Excellence and Writing Across the Curriculum program will be invited to assist the School to more clearly address this area in the fall for next year.

In the last two years, the Sports Administration program has admitted more international students to expand its influence into the international sports arena. The School graduate committee reviewed the graduation rate of international students with the length of OPIE requirements and its impact length of time in the program. Raising the TOFEL score for admissions to the School from 550 to 580 would identify students with increased communication skills and is intended to allow students to complete all requirements within a two year time period verses the current 2.5 to 3 years allowing us to admit more international students per year.

In at least one course at both the undergraduate and graduate level students are required to complete case studies that they are likely to encounter in their career. Often these are group discussions, facilitated by the instructor, that help students to formulate and articulate their views as they role play professional decisions and gain insights of the ramifications of their actions. Examples include gender equity issues in athletics, rehab and drug use in athletic training, safety and environmental issues in recreation studies and budgeting and hiring issues in all programs.

In written responses on course evaluations, students made frequent positive comments about the use of case studies.

There are several questions regarding professional behavior that preceptors are required to respond to on evaluation forms for practica and internships. A summary of last year’s responses is listed in the Accomplishments section below.

Student responses to case studies can be evaluated by comparing their answer or solution to stated professional ethical standards that exist in therapeutic recreation, athletic training and other professional disciplines. In other programs use of case studies assesses the students’ ability to deal within the parameter of applied or imposed rules or policies that exist in some organizations that must guide decisions, such as the NCAA for those going into athletic administration in intercollegiate athletics.

Role playing case studies allows for practice and mistakes in a safe environment but also allows individuals to express their own and understand others views of the same situation. The disadvantage of case studies is that often there is no answer that is 100% right or wrong. Rather, the use of case studies is a helpful learning tool allowing students to problem solve and enhance their decision making skills.

Feedback from preceptors is also used to measure professional behavior in practica or internship experiences. Preceptors are asked to respond to: ability to work with others, dependability, cooperativeness and professional attitude. The response of preceptors on a scale of 1-4, with 4 being desirable, rated 91% at 3 or better for professional behaviors during practica or internship experiences. This is first year data so comparisons cannot be made at this time, but it is a very positive response from potential employers.

New graduate admissions guidelines were established this year that require the applicant to submit a two-page biography that will identify experiences they have had, why and how they hope graduate school will help them professionally and what they plan to do after they graduate. Additionally, a standardized graduate entrance exam (GRE) is now required of all majors. We are also implementing a database that will allow us to track undergraduate and graduate GPA and entrance exam scores for the next two years to determine if we wish to raise the admission criteria in the School.

Use of case studies has also proven to be an excellent vehicle for developing and practicing skills

in this area. Students in the graduate Sports Administration program are put in administrative teams and required to identify an special event for which they must develop a marketing plan and budget. They then must present their proposal to their peers as perspective clients for funding or sponsoring of this project.

All graduate students take practica hours as a part of their coursework. Questions addressing the competencies identified in objective four are included in the new evaluation form completed by the supervisor. This allows for a review to identify strengths or weaknesses. No significant notable concerns were identified from the first year sample of responses.

Sample size of data that has been collected is not adequate to formulate any recommendations at this time.

A year ago a new course was added to the undergraduate athletic training curriculum based on feedback (Appendix C) from the previous year for the need to better prepare students for all three components, written, oral and skill, of the NATA exam. The results of the graduating students who took the test last summer indicated an average increase in the oral component score from 11.53% to 16.92% and the skill component from 7.27% to 15.92% above the national average. There was no significant change in the written component although it was also slightly above the national average.

This year’s Sports Administration team project was a partnership with World Championship Wrestling (WCW) to host a fundraising special event on campus. Students managed a budget; designed and sold print, radio and TV advertising; sold event sponsorships; designed and sold

T-shirts; and ran the operations of the event. This was so successful WCW has already committed to coming back next year.

The School still needs to broaden its assessment of the competencies in objective four into all the program disciplines in the unit.

Two new teaching models are recently being promoted by the professional physical education association. They are called "Skill Theme Instruction" and "Authentic Assessment". Both are being considered for instructional application for students taking skill methodology courses. A final determination of which model is most appropriate for our instructional needs will to be made during the next year. Video taping of student practice teaching is recorded using both models for students to gain feedback for themselves and others.

In Athletic Training a clinical skills check sheet is used on a quarterly basis to evaluate diagnostic strengths and weakness and chart progress of these skills that establishes a base line of competency for each of hundreds of injury assessments students will encounter as future trainers. Several other institutions have contacted us to implement a similar system for their students using our assessment tools as a model. A set of the forms is located in the Appendix D.

The use of video tapes allows students the opportunity to learn from each other and observe how they present themselves.

Feedback from Recreation Studies internship evaluations (Appendix E) from both students and supervisors indicated some weak areas and as a result, changes have been made. The following changes will go into effect for the next academic school year. Medical Emergency Response, REC 312 has been added to the curriculum based on feedback from the recreation internship preceptors as a needed skill for majors in Adventure Recreation. For Therapeutic Recreation, Medical Terminology for Health Administrators, HLTH 230, replaced Sports Officiating. This meets a need to strengthen their documentation skills that was identified by internship preceptors. Another influencing consideration was the fact that the clientele they primarily serve do not possess the skills or health to participate at a competitive level requiring referees. Crafts for Recreation programming was moved from a core requirement into an elective tools option since it often has specific programming needs related to working with seniors or youth but not all occupational settings. Educational Media was dropped because feedback from program evaluations by senior students indicated that it was very basic information most already possessed and it appeared to have limited educational value to the students’ career preparations.

Improvements/Enhancements/Implementation:

A three day workshop is scheduled prior to the quarter for all GA’s that teach skill or activity service courses. The GA’s will receive an orientation to teach plus an opportunity to practice their teaching skills in order to identify their own strengths and weaknesses that can be remedied.

Since a number of the GA assignments in the School is to teach service courses requiring advanced skill levels, a new GA application has been developed to screen and identify those GA’s who will be providing instruction. See Appendix F.

An exit interview or written survey was administered to all graduate students, asking them to respond in retrospect to their educational experience. Results are reported below in Improvements. Samples of the forms are found in Appendix G.

Athletic Trainers are still conducting research projects that are submitted to NATA for presentation or publication. The result of last year’s effort follows in Accomplishments.

Currently the Athletic Training majors are the only majors who identify a project early enough to work on all year in order to complete it and submit it for publication consideration. Discussions are underway to determine if this could apply to other program areas in the School.

Last year all the graduate students in Athletic Training were required to submit a research paper they completed as a part of their academic studies to the National Athletic Trainers Association

(NATA) for presentation or publication. Five papers (over 10% of those submitted) were accepted. That is slightly above the national average acceptance rate for the NATA Journal. Only one of these is a joint publication with a faculty member.

Over 50% of the Sports Administration graduate class were hired by their employer at the conclusion of their internship. The remaining half found positions in another sport related organization largely due to the experience they gained in their initial internship.

Discussions with faculty and exit interviews with graduate students will result in moving both PESS 691, Research Methods and PESS 609, Statistics to a summer-fall or fall-winter sequence to give students the course and tools to start research projects at the beginning of their studies in an effort to enable them to be able to complete more research projects for publication or presentations.

Students who were admitted into the graduate program with baccalaureate degrees from OU identified a lack of new content in some graduate level courses that they had as undergraduates (i.e., dual listed courses or the same instructor teach similar courses at both undergraduate and graduate level). Some teaching assignments were changed so the same faculty member teaching the undergraduate course was not also teaching the graduate level course and/or syllabi were revised to address this concern. This year’s graduate evaluations have yet to be compiled to identify similar concerns or others.

Develop more definitive alumni survey that could yield some data for curriculum or program changes and improvements.

All graduating seniors and graduate students will be completing an end of program assessment to provide feedback looking back over their complete educational career. This may help to identify trends for program improvements.

Add Program Advisory Committees for Athletic Training, Sport Sciences and Recreation Studies to provide an external view for outcomes assessment and curriculum.

Finalize an internship evaluation tool, separate from the student internship evaluation, that would be given one month after students have completed their assignment. The tool would be completed by the internship preceptor in an attempt to gain program assessment of how well students were prepared for the internship responsibilities and to separate it from the student’s individual evaluation.

Develop a tracking system that will indicate how many (%) seniors go on to graduate school and survey them after they complete their masters program to assess how effective their undergraduate degree was in preparing them for graduate school.