Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs)

PCC's Guidelines for Writing Student Learning Outcomes (Draft Spring 2007)
(file in MS Publisher)

Writing SLOs for your favorite class

Many faculty have reported that the hardest aspect of writing SLOs is simply getting something on paper.

• Realize you have been doing this all along, operating from intuitive and professional experience; the task now is to communicate your outcomes and assessment criteria
• As the expert in this discipline and course, begin by thinking about the 5-7 most important things a student should leave your class being able to DO.
  Remember “The essence of student learning outcomes lies in focusing on the results you want from your course rather than on what you will cover in the course.  *
• Spend 15 minutes writing down words that express the knowledge, skills or values that integrate the most important aspects of your class.  Take the Angelo and Cross “Teaching Goals Inventory” to identify the types of learning goals and outcomes you value for this class.
• Use active verbs to craft sentences that are clear and measurable. Ask yourself: how will you know when you have accomplished those outcomes.
  • 9 characteristics of ‘robust’ outcomes (or critically important competencies)
  • Lists of Affective, Cognitive, and Psychomotor action verbs related to Bloom’s Taxonomy.
• Compare the SLO drafts with the following as indicators of external expectations:
  • Course outlines
  • Core concepts articulated by professional organizations
  • Articulation and prerequisite agreements
  • Put draft SLOs in the syllabus to get student feedback and clarify perceptions
  • The next step is to measure these outcomes – to assess your work and theirs.

Material taken from the SLO Summer Institute conducted on June 24-25, 2005 for PCC faculty and administrators by Janet Fulks and Kate Pluta, of Bakersfield College.  Workbook and website by: Janet Fulks, Assessing Student Learning in Community Colleges (2004), Bakersfield College, contact: jfulks@bakersfieldcollege.edu