Unit: Theatre & Dance
Program: Dance (MA, MFA)
Degree: Master's
Date: Mon Nov 03, 2014 - 5:24:08 pm

1) Below are your program's student learning outcomes (SLOs). Please update as needed.

MA - Culture and Performance Studies

Student Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the MA Plan A dance ethnology focus degree students should have gained, developed, and refined essential knowledge, skills, and experiences necessary to successfully reach the following learning outcomes:

SLO 1:kinesthetic proficiency and conceptual understanding of various kinds of dance from diverse geographic regions, including understanding how dance is embedded in the belief systems of the people who create it, and how dance forms change and why;

SLO 2: effective oral and communication skills that demonstrate critical thinking ability and understanding of scholarly dance research concepts and related topics;

SLO 3: the ability to critically evaluate sources and clearly differentiate between one’s ideas and the ideas of others, particularly those of indigenous practitioners and scholars, and to respect divergent perspectives;

SLO 4: knowledge of the history, practices, and concepts of dance ethnology, including related published literature and current developments in the field;

SLO 5: ability to conduct and report on scholarly dance ethnology research in oral, written, and other forms;

SLO 6: ability to define individual goals and to choose appropriate pathways to achieve these goals.

 MA - Dance Education

Student Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the MA Plan B dance education focus degree students should have gained, developed and refined essential knowledge, skills and experiences necessary to successfully reach the following learning outcomes.

SLO 1: kinesthetic proficiency and conceptual understanding of various kinds of dance from diverse geographic regions;

SLO 2: comprehensive knowledge of educational theories, best practices, related published literature and current developments in the field;

SLO 3: effective oral and written communication skills that demonstrate critical thinking ability and understanding of dance education concepts and related topics;

SLO 4: ability to critically evaluate sources and clearly differentiate between one’s ideas and the ideas of others;

SLO 5: ability to design curriculum that demonstrates understanding of appropriate sequential development, multiple learning modalities, content organization and effective assessment strategies

SLO 6: ability to asses one’s own teaching and the development of one’s students as related to Hawaii State and National educational standards;  

SLO 7: ability to define individual goals and choose appropriate pathways to achieve those goals.

MFA DANCE

Student Learning Outcomes:

Upon completion of the MFA Plan A degree students should have gained, developed and refined essential knowledge, skills and experiences necessary to successfully reach the following learning outcomes.

SLO 1: Kinesthetic proficiency and conceptual understanding of various kinds of dance from diverse geographic regions

SLO 2: Effective oral and written communication skills that demonstrate critical thinking ability and understanding of dance concepts and related topics.

SLO 3: Ability to critically evaluate sources and clearly differentiate between one’s ideas and the ideas of others

SLO 4: Knowledge of the meanings, practice, theory, history and production of dance; the ability to apply, respond, reference, relate and synthesize that knowledge; the ability to draw on this knowledge and prior experience in new settings/contexts.

SLO 5: Familiarity with dance styles from diverse geographic regions

SLO 6: Development of choreographic skills and a personal style that demonstrate original works, knowledge of compositional techniques, choreographic range and effective conceptualization and conveyance of intent.

SLO 7: Ability to define individual goals and choose appropriate pathways to achieve those goals  

2) Your program's SLOs are published as follows. Please update as needed.

Department Website URL: http://manoa.hawaii.edu/dance/
Student Handbook. URL, if available online: Dance Graduate Student Handbook
Information Sheet, Flyer, or Brochure URL, if available online:
UHM Catalog. Page Number:
Course Syllabi. URL, if available online:
Other:
Other:

3) Select one option:

Curriculum Map File(s) from 2014:

4) For your program, the percentage of courses that have course SLOs explicitly stated on the syllabus, a website, or other publicly available document is as follows. Please update as needed.

0%
1-50%
51-80%
81-99%
100%

5) Did your program engage in any program assessment activities between June 1, 2013 and September 30, 2014? (e.g., establishing/revising outcomes, aligning the curriculum to outcomes, collecting evidence, interpreting evidence, using results, revising the assessment plan, creating surveys or tests, etc.)

Yes
No (skip to question 14)

6) For the period between June 1, 2013 and September 30, 2014: State the assessment question(s) and/or assessment goals. Include the SLOs that were targeted, if applicable.

Program assessment question: What methods are students using towards setting personal goals? To what degree are they able to articulate individual goals and choose appropriate pathways to achieve these goals 

Target SLO: # 6 Ability to define individual goals and to choose appropriate pathways to achieve these goals.

7) State the type(s) of evidence gathered to answer the assessment question and/or meet the assessment goals that were given in Question #6.

Evidence Gathered for SLO#6 included: 

  1. written statement of personal goals/objectives 
  2. student surveys of short term and long term goals
  3. faculty notes from individual student conferencing/advising 
  4. resume and portfolio assignments across the curriculum 
  5. written teaching philosophy and personal aesthetic statements
  6. mock job applications and interviews for professional submission  
  7. exit interview results 

 

8) State how many persons submitted evidence that was evaluated. If applicable, please include the sampling technique used.

17 Graduate Students submitted evidence and participated in evaluation processes towards assessing our program SLO#6.

6 students were in their final year, 8 students were in there second or third year and the remaining 3 were in their first year. This allowed us to see a spectrum of achievement towards SLO#6 based on students prior knowledge and skills and their learning experiences within our program.

The key skills identified under SLO#6 include but are not limited to: resume writing, professional portfolio, interview skills (professional presentation, ability to articulate personal value and skill sets) cover letter, statement of intent, teaching philosophy, artistic statement (including personal aesthetics).  

  

 

 

9) Who interpreted or analyzed the evidence that was collected? (Check all that apply.)

Course instructor(s)
Faculty committee
Ad hoc faculty group
Department chairperson
Persons or organization outside the university
Faculty advisor
Advisors (in student support services)
Students (graduate or undergraduate)
Dean/Director
Other:

10) How did they evaluate, analyze, or interpret the evidence? (Check all that apply.)

Used a rubric or scoring guide
Scored exams/tests/quizzes
Used professional judgment (no rubric or scoring guide used)
Compiled survey results
Used qualitative methods on interview, focus group, open-ended response data
External organization/person analyzed data (e.g., external organization administered and scored the nursing licensing exam)
Other:

11) For the assessment question(s) and/or assessment goal(s) stated in Question #6:
Summarize the actual results.

Program SLO #6 has two parts 1. Students ability to define individual goals and to choose appropriate pathways to achieve these goals

Based on the assessment evidence 80% of our graduate students are proficient in their ability to define their individual goals and 20% are advanced proficient. 90% of students are proficient in choosing appropriate pathways to achieve their goals, while 10% are advanced proficient. 

We assessed all of our graduate students and to no surprise those that are further along in the program performed higher on SLO#6. However, there were some entry-level students that already had advanced proficiency while some exiting students did not. Being a discipline area (dance) that has a very competitive job market and often limited available positions our students often neglect to see their potential for employment in outside or related fields. It is the ability to make these interdisciplinary connections that makes a student advanced proficient in SLO#6. Furthermore, utilizing language that appropriately self promotes and articulates the interdisciplinary skills sets gained from our discipline makes a student advanced proficient in SLO#6. Lastly, students that employ a wide variety of methods towards networking themselves, seeking opportunities and aligning their skills with industry demands are most highly achieving SLO#6.     

12) State how the program used the results or plans to use the results. Please be specific.

The dance program used the assessment results in the following ways:

  1. We will continue to implement our current efforts towards supporting students to define their goals and choose appropriate pathways to achieve those goals (i.e. individual conferencing, resume and portfolio building across the curriculum, community networking, etc.) 

  2. We developed a new course DNCE 659 "Business for the Arts" that focuses on goals setting and career pathways. Particular emphasis is on resume and cover letter writing, self-promotion and marketing, portfolio design, grant proposals, interviewing, professional networking and professional development. 

  3. We will work to expand goals setting, resume and portfolio building activities in more courses. Currently three graduate courses (DNCE 691, 651, 659) have assignments built in. Our program will expand these activities to DNCE 676, 671 and 693. We feel our student will benefit from repeated exposure to defining their goals and targeting appropriate career pathways. 

  4. We are aligning and targeting opportunities outside of UH that faculty feel best support individual student goals. This is an ongoing practice of our program, but now with greater emphasis, better alignment and greater reach to all our students. Some examples include: teaching artist internships at local schools, connecting students to faculty members in other units to collaborate on interdisciplinary projects, inviting students to present their work at professional conference and festivals alongside faculty, bringing in field professionals to counsel and advise our students in forum sessions. 

  5. We are requiring students to submit a professional resume and a statement of their professional goals at their final exit interview. They also have to verbally define to the faculty their goals and professional plans for the future and identify the necessary steps and resources to achieve them. 

13) Beyond the results, were there additional conclusions or discoveries?
This can include insights about assessment procedures, teaching and learning, program aspects and so on.

Beyond the results, our program became aware of many informal activities faculty members were engaging in to support graduate student goal setting. Learning of these activities not only generated appreciation for each others efforts, but interest to adopt them formally across our program. We uniformly agree that preparing our student for their professional future is of most importance and needs to be threaded through the entire graduate experience and not just at the end. This process has propelled us to pursue more community relations and professional networking. We are now able to implement a systematic approach to supporting student achievement of SLO#6 so that ALL our students reach it. Towards the future we would like to have more formal ways of tracking student growth towards SLO#6 over time. (i.e. a data collecting system that will allow us to graphs results for better reporting to the public and our constituents)  

14) If the program did not engage in assessment activities, please explain.
Or, if the program did engage in assessment activities, please add any other important information here.

N/A