Toward a Capacity Framework for Useful Student Learning Outcomes Assessment in College Foreign Language Programs

The educational impacts of mandated assessment in U.S. colleges is part of a growing research agenda focused on how methodologies of program evaluation best enable educators to improve teaching and learning. Accordingly, research has tried to identify the key aspects of evaluation/assessment 'capacity' in college language departments (i.e., environmental conditions and personnel factors) that seem most associated with meaningful reform and evaluation use. This article reports on a provisional framework of evaluation/assessment capacity for university foreign language (FL) programs. Factor analysis was performed on questionnaire data from 204 university language educators reporting on their program assessment activities. Results suggested a set of program-level and institutional capacity elements grouped into 7 categories: (a) institutional support (funding, training, expertise, etc.), (b) institutional governance and leadership, (c) facultative infrastructures (e.g., curricular maps, assessment plans), (d) program-level support (financial, personnel resources), (e) a prevailing program ethos conducive to educational innovation, (f) pro-assessment attitudes, and (g) high-quality assessment activities and abilities (i.e., dimensions of assessment practice at advanced levels of skill and experience). The framework delineates a provisional set of theory-based, empirically supported program factors linked to assessment usefulness in postsecondary FL education and provides educators a set of guidelines to develop their assessment capabilities.