Assessment Handbook – Portfolios

Definition:

A portfolio is a collection of student work, usually representing student work over time, such as from the first course in the major until the last semester of the senior year.

Advantages:

Portfolios enable faculty:

· To assess complex sets of tasks and objectives, with examples of many different types of student work, including interdisciplinary learning and capabilities;

· To assess more rigorous and higher order thinking, such as application, synthesis, and evaluation;

· To track student work over time;

· To examine not only final student projects, but also, if the faculty think it worthwhile, to look at drafts and earlier phases of student projects;

· To place the responsibility for demonstrating competence or mastery upon the student;

· To help students reflect upon their learning and, in the process of compiling the portfolio, to understand more about what they have and have not yet learned;

· To provide students with documentation for job applications or applications to graduate school.

Disadvantages:

Portfolios:

· Require more time for faculty to evaluate than tests or single-sample assessments;

· Require students to compile their own work, usually outside of class;

· Do not easily demonstrate lower-level thinking, such as recall of knowledge;

· May threaten students who limit their learning to cramming for tests or doing work at the last minute;

· Require a system of storage that may take time or space to set up (see electronic portfolios later.

Varieties of Portfolios:

Electronic Portfolios:

The use of computers now allows institutions and faculty to require students to establish electronic portfolios. Some institutions, such as Dartmouth, Connecticut College, and Wesleyan, have created electronic portfolio systems that not only could be used for assessment, but for other purposes such as registration, advising, and resumé-building. In lieu of an electronic portfolio program, faculty can require students to submit all their work (outside of in-class tests) on disk or to upload copies of their work to a central file system. Then, when it is time to assess the student portfolios, faculty can access those files and assess them in whatever way they think best. (Electronic portfolios also facilitate the submission of video clips, audio clips, or other media.)

Click here for the Idea Notebook developed by Michael Marx and Kate Berheide.

Click here for an article by Trent Batson discussing varieties of e-portfolios and issues related to them, as well as links to various resources.

Click here for links to colleges and universities using portfolio assessments, provided by Douglas Eder, SIUE

Click here for examples and discussion from a conference at Iowa State.

Click here for an example from Georgia State's Rhetoric and Composition Program

Showcase Portfolios:

A showcase portfolio is one in which students are asked to select and submit a selected sample of their work, such as (a) their best work; (b) their work that they wish they had a chance to improve; or (c) work they are most proud of. A reflective essay or an introductory memo to the faculty can then explain the work, reflect upon how it demonstrates the accomplishments of the student, and/or draw attention to why the student selected those particular examples.

Comprehensive Portfolios:

A comprehensive portfolio can include virtually everything that the student has ever produced, if the facultydesign it that way. The guidelines for the portfolio can be directly related to the learning outcomes that the student is expected to achieve and can serve as a checklist for the student to follow. Faculty might ask the student to submit examples of a specific number of tests, experiments, problems solved, applications of knowledge outside of class, of case study analyses, or of any other types of work typically expected by the discipline.

Open-ended Portfolios:

An open-ended portfolio leaves it up to the student to decide what to submit in order to demonstrate mastery of the specific learning outcomes that the student has been expected to achieve. Students might submit evidence that is not drawn from the classes themselves, such as work on student clubs, travel, museum visits, summer work, internships, and other experiences. Because faculty cannot predict what students may submit, scoring the portfolio may be a more complex task than scoring the other types of portfolios, but may actually lead to very pleasant surprises about how students have benefited from what they have been taught.

Creating and designing a portfolio assessment system:

1. Determine the specific broad learning objectives for the academic program;
2. List the kinds of student work that students might include to demonstrate mastery of the learning outcomes;
3. Determine which kind of portfolio you want students to create;
4. Develop a rubric to score the portfolio (see below);
5. Include the rubric with your instructions to students so that they understand how the portfolio will be evaluated;
6. Write instructions for the students on how to create the portfolio and how it will be used;
7. Inform students that they are responsible for creating the portfolio;
8. Instruct students to label each part of the portfolio according to the learning objective being demonstrated;
9. Instruct students what they are to write as an introduction to the portfolio or as a reflective essay;
10. Instruct students that they are to discuss each sample of student work included in the portfolio, either as an introduction to the sample or within the introductory or reflective essay;
11. Determine how and when students will first be introduced to the portfolio requirement, such as an introductory course in the major or when the student meets with his or her advisor;
12. Score the portfolio using the rubric that you devised.

The Scoring Rubric:

Since rubrics vary, try to design one that will allow the faculty to assess the portfolio both efficiently and effectively.

1. List each learning objective in which the student must demonstrate mastery.
2. Develop a scale for scoring the rubric, such as one of the options below:
1. Grades for each learning objective;
2. A score (e.g., 1 – 5) for each learning objective;
3. A scale of three categories, e.g., below standard, meets the standard, and exemplary.
3. Review actual portfolios to establish common agreement about the scoring. The faculty should agree upon what constitutes a specific grade, score, or category, perhaps reading a sample of portfolios together and discussing them before scoring all portfolios.
4. Allow some space for faculty to make some notes on their observations, so that the team assessing the portfolios can summarize the strengths and weaknesses that faculty can address later.

Rubric Examples:

Learning Objective	Below Standard	Meets the standard	Exemplary
The student is able to present research findings accurately and clearly.	The student does not communicate the research process or findings accurately and clearly.	The student communicates the research process accurately and clearly.	The student’s presentation is creative and insightful, demonstrating great potential for future success.
The student thinks critically.	The student’s work simply meets the minimum standards of course work.	The student shows evidence of a developing capacity for critical thinking.	The student’s thinking is creative, thoughtful, insightful, and challenges the reader to rethink the issues being considered.

Learning Objective	1	2	3	4	5
The student is able to apply principles of fluid dynamics to describe phenomena in nature.

For a rubric based upon an AAC&U presentation, go here.

For other examples of scoring rubrics, see the section on Performance Assessment.

Sample of Skidmore departments using portfolios: Education, Mathematics