Assessment Grants Program
General Info | Eligibility | Purpose of Grants | Criteria | Funding & Expectations | Deadline
The Coastal Carolina University Assessment Grant Program provides grants to support faculty and staff members in their quest to examine the effectiveness of their academic programs, programs related to student development, or services to students and the university. Funded projects promise to contribute to the assessment system of Coastal Carolina University as well as to the professional development of the personnel involved. Individuals awarded grants during the 2009-2010 academic year will disseminate assessment findings during spring semester, 2011. Long-term impact of the results from the grant should be included in the annual assessment report of the unit to which the grant is awarded.
All full-time Coastal Carolina University faculty and professional staff are invited to submit proposals for the Coastal Carolina University Assessment Grant Program. Collaboration across institutional units is strongly recommended.
The purpose of the establishment of the Coastal Carolina University Assessment Grant Program is to foster an environment that will assist informed decision making for continuous improvement and accountability and help document change that occurs through the use of assessment results. The grant program will allow faculty and staff to explore avenues of assessment and investigate institutional curiosity concerning how to assess for accountability based on strengths, while at the same time assess for improvement based on weakness. More importantly the grant program will assist in the development of a sustainable culture of inquiry concerning the major components of our assessment system: student learning, student development, and administrative unit operations.
Grant applications are evaluated based on the quality of the design and its potential to contribute to assessment efforts at Coastal Carolina University. Grantsmust be able to tie back to assessment of student learning, to student development, or to administrative unit operations. Awarding of grants will be decided by a committee composed of individuals representing academic colleges, Student Affairs, and other administrative units.
Assessments must align with student learning outcome/s, student development outcome/s, or administrative objective/s of an institutional unit/s. Documentation of change to the university unit/s must be included in the final report. Awardees of the grant must be willing to share their assessment project and use results during the Spring, 2011 semester.
Faculty and professional staff may either:
1. design a new assessment, collect and analyze data, and use the results;
2. redesign an assessment that is currently being used, collect and analyze data, and use the results;
3. triangulate data across at least two major components of the assessment system (student learning, student development, administrative unit operations) and make recommendations on use of the results;
4. conduct a study to determine if the assessment(s) used is reliable and valid;
5. examine data already collected by the university but where use of results has not yet been completed;
6. conduct a study to determine if the assessment(s) used predicts student success; or
7. examine the use of results from piloting a new commercial instrument.
Individual awards will have an overall limit of $2,500 per project, while large-scale awards (projects that involve three or more faculty or staff) can have a maximum amount of $7,500. Funds cannot be used for travel or release time. Funds can be used for the following:
1. Resources/ materials
2. Student employee salaries
3. Purchase of an assessment instrument not already implemented at Coastal Carolina University
4. Purchase of hardware or software
5. Faculty or professional staff stipends
Proposals must be submitted by email to Dr. Barbara Buckner at bbuckner@coastal.edu, and signature pages forwarded to Dr. Buckner in 121 Singleton Hall, no later than November 15, 2009.