ePortfolios

Strengthen Program Design and Assessment with an ePortfolio

Digital artifacts offer a powerful means for measuring learning at the program level and at CDLI we are interested in ePortfolios because they have the potential to strengthen program design in a number of ways. A carefully-planned ePortfolio initiative will

• reveal how well outcomes are being met;
• provide a quick and authentic curriculum map, highlighting gaps and redundancies;
• showcase the great work coming out of the program;
• make student work available to stakeholders for feedback about the program.

Benefits for Students in the Program

A well-designed ePortfolio initiative provides students with a clear map of program expectations because ePortfolios forefront program outcomes. Students benefit from a full understanding of disciplinary expectations and clear descriptions of what mastery looks like. Students learn by systematically evaluating their own work - all of their work across all of their courses - against the expectations of the discipline. ePortfolios prompt students to ask:

• Why these outcomes?
• What do they mean in relation to me?
• How are they relevant to my life?
• What are the expectations of the discipline?
• How can I best demonstrate that I’ve met the program’s outcomes?

Through reflective practice, ePortfolios increase students' metacognition around their own learning and help them to become life-long learners.

Benefits for Faculty Designing Assignments

ePortfolios make the job of creating valid assessments more concrete. When instructors begin with the question, "What assignment can I design that students will be able to put in their ePortfolios as evidence that they have met this outcome (or these outcomes)?" the result is much more likely to be a meaningful and authentic assessment. Faculty become invested program evaluation when they come to the table to compare ePortfolio assignments and see how their own assignments fit in with their colleagues' assignments to assure that program outcomes are being met.

Working with CDLI

Please contact us if you are thinking about using ePortfolios for program assessment. We would love to work with you to determine the ePortfolio approach that would best suit your needs.

To give you an idea of the process we offer a Step-by-Step Guide to Implement an ePortfolio Program (PDF).