This Year's Topics Included

Assessing Students' Learning - A Collaborative Campus Commitment that Can Respond to Multiple Audiences' Needs
Presenter: Peggy L. Maki - Education Consultant and Assessment Series Editor, Stylus Publishing, LLC

Increasingly, international, federal, regional and specialized accrediting bodies are requiring colleges and universities to document what students learn during their undergraduate and graduate careers. That is, these bodies are asking institutions to provide evidence that students' work demonstrates the range of knowledge, abilities, habits of mind, ways of knowing and problem solving, and dispositions that an institution claims it teaches or develops. Increasingly, the rising costs of higher education are prompting parents and students themselves to ask more specific questions--than ever before--about how well a college or university's educational programs and services prepare students for future employment, graduate school, and the kinds of flexibility required in the current workforce. And, increasingly, since the 1995 publication of Barr and Tagg's article, "From Teaching to Learning: A New Paradigm for Undergraduate Education," institutions are shifting towards a learner-centered paradigm that recognizes higher education needs to shift away from relying solely on inputs, such as course content or professional credentials, to what and how students learn and make meaning of their learning both inside and outside of the classroom. Thus, we are now becoming focused on what and how students transfer, integrate, apply, reapply, and even re-position their learning over their studies within the context of our educational practices.

This keynote describes how an assessment system, such as TaskStream's, provides higher education institutions with the opportunity to provide chronological evidence of student learning to address multiple audiences' needs:

1. external audiences - accreditors, parents, and potential students
2. internal college or university audiences - including campus leaders, administrators, faculty, staff, and enrolled students themselves.

TaskStream - Present and Future
Presenters: Webster Thompson - Executive Vice President, TaskStream, Maaike Bouwmeester - Director of Product Development, TaskStream

This presentation will introduce the newest features of TaskStream and provide a preview of future enhancements to our toolset. These tools will be used by faculty, administrators, and assessment coordinators to facilitate and support the full cycle of continuous improvement- from outcomes identification, to assessment planning, to the documentation of results and strategies for action. In a sneak preview, this presentation will reveal these new tools for the first time.

The REFLECT Initiative: Researching Electronic portFolios: Learning, Engagement and Collaboration through Technology
Presenters: Dr. Helen Barrett - Research Project Director for The REFLECT Initiative, Diane Bennett - Wilson County Schools, Tennessee, Mindi Kugler - Cave Creek Unified District, Arizona, Connie Hendrix - San Francisco Unified School District, California

This presentation will look at the use of TaskStream in K-12 schools as well as in teacher professional development, with a focus on student-centered strategies which enhance the learning process. Dr. Barrett will discuss the REFLECT Initiative research being sponsored by TaskStream over the last year and a half. One focus will be on how students perceive their electronic portfolios through survey and focus group data. Teachers who are leading the REFLECT implementation in several schools will also be present to talk about what is happening in their programs.

TaskStream: Introduction and Implementation Strategies
Presenter: Webster Thompson - Executive Vice President, TaskStream

This session will include an introductory demonstration of TaskStream to provide a conceptual understanding of how organizations are currently using TaskStream and share successful implementation strategies. This session is recommended for institutions that have recently begun their exploration of TaskStream.

Designing Standards-Based Curriculum
Presenters: Linda Madden - Bryan School District, Texas; Jared Lancer - Academic English Mastery/Closing the Achievement Gap Branch of the Los Angeles Unified School District, California; John Boccuzzi - New Fairfield Schools, Connecticut

This session includes a demonstration of how school districts are taking advantage of TaskStream's Instructional Design tools to create, map and manage standards-based curriculum. We will also discuss how the curriculum can be distributed using TaskStream's Cybrary.

NCATE Accreditation
Presenters: Dr. Sara McPherson - New York Institute of Technology; Dr. John Fischetti - University of North Carolina, Wilmington; Dr. Phil Schmidt - Western Governors University, Online

This session will showcase how TaskStream is being used at various colleges and universities to collect the data needed to support NCATE accreditation. Several universities will share details about their experiences during their NCATE visits and their interactions with the Board of Examiners.

Using TaskStream to Demonstrate Program Effectiveness
Presenters: Dr. Meredith Curley - University of Phoenix; Dr. Carol Kominski - Texas Woman's University

This session will be focused on how TaskStream can be used to demonstrate program effectiveness. The presenters will share details about the experiences of their universities.

Choosing an Eportfolio and Assessment System
Presenters: Dr. Emily Brizendine & Dr. Jodi Servatius - California State University, East Bay; Jennifer McCreadie - George Mason University, Virginia

Members of the selection team will outline the process and information they used to choose an E-portfolio and assessment system for their organization.

Training and Documenting Highly Qualified Teaching
Presenters: Dr. Susan O'Hara - California State University, Sacramento, TaskStream; Irene Collins - Norwalk-La Mirada Unified School District, California

Many districts have identified professional development as an area of concern. This session will discuss how some districts are utilizing TaskStream to manage and track their professional development initiatives through to successful classroom implementation.

Teacher Education
Presenters: Dr. Wayne Bacer & Timothy Brinkley - Azusa Pacific University, California; Dr. John Miazga - Angelo State University, Texas; Dr. Bob Hannafin & Vanessa Every - University of Connecticut

Demonstrations of how different colleges and universities are using TaskStream within their teacher education programs in various ways to collect assessment data and signature artifacts from their students for continuous improvement.

Implementing TaskStream across the Campus
Presenters: Kent Whitman - Franklin Pierce College, New Hampshire; Dr. Mary Jo Gorney-Moreno - San Jose State University, California

Faculty members will share their experiences with implementing TaskStream for their programs. They will discuss the challenges they experienced as they assisted faculty with the development of rubrics and Directed Response Folio templates for assessment programs.

About TaskStream--For over a decade, TaskStream (www.taskstream.com) has pioneered advancements in educational excellence and has been committed to helping meet educational performance challenges by providing Web-based solutions that enhance community, increase collaboration and support learner-centered education across the organization. TaskStream’s solutions can be customized to meet the needs of the individual learner or teacher/instructor in any of the following markets: higher education, secondary education, and professional and skills training in the corporate, government and not-for-profit sectors.

Press Contact: Lyn Cooperman 71 W 23rd Street, 14th Floor New York, NY 10010 Ph: 212-868-2700 Fax: 212-868-2947 lcooperman@taskstream.com