Music Department Assessment: Semester Juries

Jane Riegel Ferencz University of Wisconsin – Whitewater, Department of Music

Introduction In summer 2014 I began working to establish a method for aggregating and assessing results from student semester performance juries. This embedded assessment is a High Impact Practice ubiquitous to college music departments and includes students from all of our degree programs and levels. As such, it is an important source of direct assessment of student learning for our program. Because juries assess musical performances and technical skill, evaluations are qualitative, rather than quantitative.

Method, Results, & Lessons Learned

Collection: •  Collect and record data from BM jury forms (SLOs and ranking

only; BA and Minors were not collected) •  Involves collecting and collating results from several hundred jury

rubric forms (each student is assessed by 2-10 faculty, depending on Area). Eventually, we will sample these results.

Results TBA:

•  Create a report of the outcomes of these assessments, focusing on the overall results though noting the individual SLOs as well. This report is in progress.

Lessons learned from initial assessment of FA2014 data:

•  Faculty jurors are fairly consistent in their assessment of the same student (there are no widely diverging results)

•  Although rubrics are on a 3- or 4-point scale, departmental culture is to include a number of “in between” points (2.5, 1.5). I will adjusted the reporting mechanism to reflect these gradations.

Student Learning Outcomes Assessed Juries assess the following Music Department SLOs:

Performance and Pedagogy: 1. Students will have the technical ability necessary to work independently as a musician and fully express themselves in performance on their primary instrument/voice 2. Students will have a broad knowledge of the solo repertoire of their primary instrument/voice and be able to perform competently in multiple styles/genres, alone and in collaboration with other musicians 5. Students will have the technical command necessary to teach students to perform on their primary instrument/voice

Rubrics and Assessment Method

Music performance juries assess a student’s technical and musical development over a semester and, collectively, throughout their undergraduate career. Each performance area has developed assessment rubrics which are used at each jury. In addition, written and verbal comments are provided to students at the time of the jury. This assessment, using these procedures, is the most ubiquitous type of assessment in a Music department.

Overview •  Semester performance juries require music students to perform a

variety of compositions that they have studied and prepared with their faculty instructor over the course of the semester.

•  Length of performance and difficulty of repertoire are determined by major and level (i.e. a senior performance major will perform a longer and more difficult program than a sophomore music minor, even if performing on the same instrument/voice).

•  Most BM music majors study in each level twice; students at 300 and 400 levels have passed an upper-division jury at the end of the 200 level, permitting them to register for more advanced coursework.

•  In most college music programs, BM students enroll in this series of courses for 7-8 semesters.

Voice Jury Repertoire List

Voice Jury Rubric

Conclusions

•  This project is a work-in-progress, intended to continue during subsequent semesters.

•  Because all music students participate in this assessment, it provides a snapshot of student learning throughout the entire department.

•  Over a period of several years, Area Coordinators will be able to plot trends and discuss needed alterations in the rubrics themselves or in our curriculum (Are these assessments useful or do we need to assess other things? Are most students achieving the outcomes we are assessing?). Results can be shared collectively or by level.

•  These reports will also be useful to include in campus reports as evidence of direct assessment of student work. Future refinements by degree emphasis may be helpful, as well.

Accreditation Guidelines

We are fully-accredited by the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM). NASM provides the following guidelines for assessing student achievement and competencies:

e. Music units have available a broad range of evaluation techniques such as juries, critiques, course-specific and comprehensive examinations, institutional reviews, peer reviews, and the performance of graduates in various settings. Information gained is used as an integral part of planning and projection efforts. However, the institution and the music unit should ensure and make clear that evaluation, planning, and projections exist to serve the music unit’s programs, rather than the reverse. Periodic cost/benefit analyses, in terms of improvements to student learning in music, are strongly encouraged for all music units and externally imposed evaluation systems.   g. Overreliance on quantitative measures is inconsistent with the pursuit of quality in the arts. The higher the level of achievement, the more strongly this pertains.   Source: NASM Handbook, 2013-2014, p. 73