Post on 27-Mar-2023
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• The extent to which ‘codes of practice’ for the provision of education to international students relate to this:
• “all materials truthfully and accurately describe….nature of programs”
• Element of protection for the good name of the country
• Legislation covering advertising/false advertising – even when code is absent
• The ‘communication gap’ between the marketing department and academic programs
• Students who are not satisfied with the contents of the program
• High level of program switching in the Netherlands
• data
• All boils down to ‘transparency and clarity’
Motivation
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• Competence – a quality, ability, capacity, or skill that is developed by and belongs to the student:
• Represent a dynamic combination of cognitive and metacognitive skills, demonstration of knowledge and understanding, interpersonal, intellectual and practical skills, and (ethical) values
• Learning outcome – a measurable result of a learning experience that allows us to ascertain to which extent/level/standard a competence has been formed or enhanced; learning outcomes belong to the educational experience
Definitions
Adapted from Lokhoff et al., 2010
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• A proposed method for:
• organising learning outcomes
• constructing a set of learning outcomes
• An explicit link between learning outcomes and marketing
‘New’ ? - in this presentation
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• Guide to formulating degree program profiles (Tuning Project)
• A degree profile should contain 15 – 20 Program Learning Outcomes (PLOs)
• PLOs are intended outcomes until a student has successfully completed all relevant assessment; then they are achieved outcomes
• PLOs are made up of an accumulation of course or module LOs
Program Learning Outcomes
Adapted from Lokhoff et al., 2010
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• Play a crucial role in the process of validation and recognition of a qualification
• Offer insight into what a student knows, understands , and is able to demonstrate after successful completion of a period of assessed learning resulting in a qualification
• Are related to relevant cycle descriptors (Bachelor, Master, PhD)
• Together they should fully express the characteristic features of the program – include important common and distinguishing aspects
• Check consistency with (inter-)national standards, take into account international reference points for learning outcomes
PLOs
Adapted from Lokhoff et al., 2010
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• Moving from students who are advantaged by provided education to customers of a service organisation
• Competition amongst producers of complex products
• Cars: more (desirable) features than my competition
• Desirable: advanced, enhanced function, more options for the driving experience, higher quality, better performance, etc.
• So why are we offering products for the same cost (as a car – either in fees or as life investment) and are underselling the product?
• History of higher education: a privilege at society’s cost, no thought about a consumer relationship
• An ivory tower attitude, jobs for graduates was not a problem
Marketing 101!
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• Why leave it at 15 to 20?
• Would you not want to list all the features of your program?
• Or at least those which make sense to stakeholders?
• Does not make sense in an increased competitive environment
• Which PLOs should be provided to whom? (compare: technical repair manual with owner’s manual, or marketing brochure)
• Who is going to read what?
• Reverse engineering may be difficult
• If your program is described in competences, convert competences in PLOs?
• A bottom-up and top-down combination may just be easiest
How to get to 15-20 PLOs?
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PLO = MLO+…+MLO
MLO 1a MLO 2a MLO 3a MLO 4a
MLO 1b MLO 2b MLO 3b PLO 4
MLO 1c
MLO 2cMLO 1d
MLO 3b
PLO 3
PLO 2
PLO 1Time
Learning Lines1 2 3 4
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• This will follow:
• Established practice
• According to objectives and aims of modules or courses
• Depends on the need and interrelatedness of components (e.g. using Bloom’s taxonomy)
• Pragmatic approach may be to construct from existing program and select lines that end in presently established PLOs
• Gap identification, redundancy
• Discussion with other cognate programs
Assembly of learning lines
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Modules in a program
PLO 3MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLO MLO
MLO
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MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLOMLO
MLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
13
Unique features
PLO 3MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
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MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLO MLO
MLO
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MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
PLOMLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLOMLO
MLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLOMLO
MLOMLO MLO
MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO MLO
MLO MLO MLO
MLO
MLO
PLO 3
=unique starting feature
=unique program feature
=unique outcome
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A superset of PLOs • Create a superset of PLOs (e.g. 40 – 60)
• Submit to stakeholder prioritisation
• Stakeholder groups:
• Students
• Staff of the program (contents experts) and staff outside the program (learned ‘general public’), national domain coordination teams, etc.
• Employers and alumni (knowledge of the employment field and the transition), relevant boards, etc.
• Institutional management and education support staff
• Marketing and communication staff (what does the market want, how can this be communicated)
• Mathematically assemble ranking list
• Re-submit to stakeholders, asking whether current ranking is OK, or comment
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Stakeholders issues • Be aware of limitations and power of stake holder groups
• E.g. employers – are they able to gauge relevancy across domains, new inter-disciplinarity, future of profession, do they understand these learning outcomes?, etc.
• E.g. legislatively installed boards that must approve a curriculum
• Weighting to be applied?
• Create steering group (mix of stakeholders), assess final outcome
• Consider the categories of PLOs (generic, sector-specific, unique features (global, regional, national, local)
• Create sets of PLOs for different purposes:
• Comprehensive collection for internal purposes
• Marketing collection for external purposes
• Employment collection for graduate career entry
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Finally, consider this • Increasingly HEIs are looking to offer students a more personalised
learning experience to match interests and talent
• For students to be able to create their own set of PLOs within the limits of the program offers significant advantage
• A comprehensive set of PLOs that an individual student has achieved can become part of their own record.
• The language used in the PLOs will assist a student to respond to selection criteria for a particular function
• If a national profile exists (e.g. in the NL) the national profile may be the superset (40-60), or even bigger, but set limits to minimal inclusion in the various categories of PLOs – this might be applied with more ‘force’ by legislatively installed professional boards (e.g. medical board, etc.)
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Marketing and PLOs • Marketing a degree is about attracting the right students
• Layering concept (program’s USP, HEI, environment, sequel)
• A degree is not about the program, but about the student
• Marketing a program is therefore ultimately about marketing its graduates:
• HEIs increasingly seek to market their programs through the success of graduates in finding employment or further study
• Assisting graduates in making the step into a career by providing a comprehensive set of learning outcomes, which they are taught how to match to selection criteria
• This way we put graduates into control of their own destiny