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Resource Center and Instructions

This page was designed to provide faculty with a variety of resources aimed at improving their course's chances at an expedited approval when going through the GEC-to-GEF course change in the Registrar's Course Inventory Management system (CIM). The resources represent areas that are regularly found as deficient in the Faculty Senate GEF Committee review process.

At any point in the process of reviewing a course's learning outcomes, assessment techniques, or preparing the CIM form for submission, assistance or consultation can be requested from the Teaching and Learning Commons.

List of resources on this page

1. Step-by-step guide for submitting GEC-to-GEF course change request in CIM
2. LEAP Essential Learning Outcomes and Value rubrics
3. Guide to writing powerful outcomes that work
4. List of verbs for writing outcomes arranged by Bloom's taxonomy
5. Guide to describing assessment techniques
6. Guide to alignment between learning outcomes and assessments

Step-by-step guide for submitting GEC-to-GEF course change request in CIM

For those faculty seeking to submit their GEC-to-GEF course changes in CIM to the Faculty Senate GEF Committee for review, the following is a step-by-step guide for navigating the assigned areas in CIM: or view the following screencast. 

Note: If you receive an 'Out of Synch' message for your course that prevents you from editing the course in CIM, contact Sean McGowan in the Registrar's Office for assistance. You may also be unable to edit the course if the course is already in CIM workflow for other changes. Once the course has completed workflow, it will again be open for edits.

The Faculty Senate GEF Committee also recommends reviewing the following document which gives detailed guidance about answering the GEF prompts at the end of the CIM form. 

LEAP Essential Learning Outcomes and Value rubrics

As described on the GEF Assessment Plan page, one of the most crucial steps in assuring GEF program-level assessment is the alignment of a particular GEF course with one-and-only-one LEAP Essential Learning Outcome and an accompanying Value rubric. For the GEC-to-GEF course change, all faculty must do is select a LEAP Essential Learning Outcome that they want their course to be associated with. Further instruction about actual assessment practices will be provided to the relevant group of GEF faculty at the time when their associated LEAP Essential Learning Outcome is being assessed.

Guide to writing powerful outcomes that work

One of the most common areas for which course changes are rolled back to faculty for further revision are their course learning outcomes/objectives. Effective learning outcomes are those that are both clear and measurable. Faculty are encouraged to review their course learning outcomes before submitting the course change request.

The Teaching and Learning Commons at WVU has a site aimed at helping faculty go from start to finish in crafting,
" powerful outcomes that work."

List of verbs for writing outcomes arranged by Bloom's taxonomy

As noted above, one of the most persistent areas of weakness in course review is the crafting of clear and measurable course learning objectives/outcomes that are also associated with the appropriate level of learning. Bloom's taxonomy of learning and its associated verbs is one useful tool in crafting measurable outcomes that is also easy to navigate.

Bloom's basic chart of verbs arranged by the level/type of learning. 

Complex chart that arranges the levels/types of learning, verbs, and associated learning activities into a polygon.

Guide to describing assessment techniques

One area of course syllabi that is often found lacking is the specific description of assessment types that are used within a course. Faculty are encouraged to provide as much information as possible about the substantial assessments within a course. The Summary of 50 Course Assessment Techniques is a potential resource for faculty struggling with finding either innovative methods of assessment or appropriate terminology in describing their assessments. Additional information and examples can be found at the University of Illinois' Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning, Vanderbilt University's Center for Teaching, and the University of Michigan's Center for Research on Teaching and Learning.

  • Weak example: This course will use a combination of tests and essays to assess student performance.
  • Strong example: This course will use multiple choice and short answer tests to assure declarative level knowledge for course content. It will also use a series of short problem-solution essays that are evaluated primarily for how they apply course knowledge in proposing solutions to contemporary concerns within the field.
    • Italicized language in the strong example was adapted from the resources in Bloom's taxonomy above 

Guide to alignment between learning outcomes and assessments

One of the most frequent issues seen in courses across the university system in all modalities is the alignment between learning outcomes and assessments. The basic idea is to provide a clear explanation for how particular assessments and assessment techniques directly support course learning outcomes and the associated LEAP Essential Learning Outcome.

Quality Matters has several instructional design standards that indicate one potential framework for the evaluation of alignment.

This is an example for creating detailed alignment from course units to course learning outcomes to assignments/assessments and activities,  Faculty are NOT expected to map out there course to this level of specificity but the example demonstrates how assignments and outcomes can be linked.