Validating the effectiveness of a locally developed assurance of learning assessment

Standards for accreditation by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business emphasize the assessment of student learning as an avenue to continuously improve business school curricula. The study reported here, which took place in an Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business-accredited business school in a mid-sized regional university in the southeastern United States, is an in-depth review of an internally created assurance of learning assessment instrument designed to directly measure student learning across a set of core courses. Results of the study indicate that facets of the assessment are significantly related to students' grades in their previous core courses as well as to their performance in a later capstone course. This suggests that carefully developed, internally crafted assessments may be valid means to assess student learning.