Given the enormity of the public and private investment in US higher education, of course we should evaluate its effectiveness. But, how?
It is claimed that over 200 higher education institutions administer the one-size-fits-all Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA). When administered pre-post—that is, near the beginning and then again near the end of a student’s program—the difference in scores on equivalent forms of the same test (i.e., the “gain score”) represents how much students have learned in that program. Or does it?
Everyone knows that any one test cannot be valid in all contexts. Administering an advanced calculus exam to kindergarteners would not tell us much, for example, nor would administering it as a college exit exam for art majors. College students study a wide variety of topics.
According to the CLA’s owner, the Council for Aid to Education (CAE),
One of the unique features of CLA+ is that no prior knowledge of any specific content area is necessary in order to perform well on the assessment.
Given that much of a student’s time in college is devoted to accumulating knowledge of specific content, this seems problematic. And according to cognitive scientists, it is. “Higher-order” skills, such as lateral thinking and experimentation, depend on the accumulation of a critical mass of knowledge. Content-free or generic skills do not exist.
If not from cognitive scientists, then, where does the belief in generic skills come from? Ed schools. The cynic in me wants to classify this as another attempt by US educators to hide from meaningful measurement. One of them might say, however, that factual content is readily available just a mouse click away on the internet. Such is true, but only in isolated, disaggregated forms.
Look beyond the college promotional froth about building better citizens, molding character, and teaching “higher-order skills,” such as “reasoning, critical reading and evaluation, and critique.” One will find remaining the more measurable and unfairly derogated benefit of “recall of factual knowledge,” which the CLA eschews.