Employers' Perceptions on American Association of Colleges and Universities Essential Learning Outcomes

Lecture | Thursday, June 22, 2023 | 12:00 - 1:00 p.m. PT |

In a world where the workforce is changing and the attainment of a higher education credential is essential; the need to build connections, establish effective communication, and cultivate partnerships between employers and academia is critical. Are your students ready for the workforce, and how would you know? What skills are important to employers and do they mirror what institutions value as important skills?  Are employers aware of different frameworks institutions are using to build curriculum and evaluate learning? This webinar will provide a brief background on learning and employability frameworks, the current use of the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) essential learning outcomes, share findings from focus groups with line managers supervising recent graduates, discuss instructional strategies to improve skills identified by the line managers as important but weak, and consider opportunities for collaboration between employers and academia.

Speaker Bios:

Dr. Tara Rose serves as Director of Assessment at Louisiana State University. Working collaboratively with faculty, staff, and administrators, she leads academic quality efforts at the program and university level. Dr. Rose has over 20 years of experience in assessment and outcomes analysis. She began her career with a nonprofit organization and has also spent time at the state level working for the Kentucky Legislative Research Commission and the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education. She previously served as the Director of Assessment at the University of Kentucky and has 10 years of online teaching experience with Eastern Kentucky University in the Department of Homeland Security.  In 2019, Dr. Rose was appointed as Senior Fellow with the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U). She was instrumental in the creation of the Multi-State Collaborative for Learning Outcomes Assessment, a thirteen-state collaborative that used the VALUE rubrics as a shared standard to establish direct evidence of the quality of student learning to strengthen state and national policy discussions. She was a founding member of the Association for the Assessment of Learning in Higher Education and a Board Member from 2014-2021, previously holding the position of President in AY 2015-16. She is co-editor of Exemplars of Assessment in Higher Education: Diverse Approaches to Addressing Accreditation Standards (July 2021) and Exemplars of Assessment in Higher Education: Strategies for a Changing Higher Education Environment (expected January 2024).

Dr. Teresa Flateby is formerly the Associate Vice President of Institutional Effectiveness at Georgia Southern University, where she was responsible for developing and facilitating centralized assessment and institutional effectiveness processes that were subsequently embedded in all units of the University. Previously, Teresa served as the Director of Academic Assessment at the University of South Florida. She feels strongly about building capacity in institutions to understand and practice assessment and institutional effectiveness processes that include planning, implementing, analyzing, and documenting processes to address units’ and the institution’s strategic plans and the goals associated with this plan. She also advocates for ensuring that graduates are well-prepared to be successful in their chosen careers and in an evolving world. Teresa’s thirty-year academic background includes community college and university teaching and university administration experiences. While at Georgia Southern University, she also directed an institution-wide program to effectively build and further enhance students’ writing and critical thinking in their majors, which emphasized application of these skills to career-focused responsibilities.    Teresa holds a PhD in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Measurement, Research, and Evaluation from the University of South Florida.