SEAHO Report - Winter 2022 - 20

FEATURE ARTICLES
Assessment - Unite!
Katie M. Lewis, University of North Florida
This past year, many professionals that are involved in
the Florida Housing Officers (FHO) identified a need to discuss a
topic that is often talked about yet is not as unpacked and
critically examined as it may warrant: assessment. We
gathered around our Zoom meeting, sharing our department's
current climate on assessment, where we responded to
questions such as, " Where does assessment sit within the
department/division? " , " What tools do we
use? " , " What projects are in the
pipeline? " , and " What resources would be
helpful? " Those immersed in assessment work often
emphasize the need (basically requirement) that assessment
should be factored into everyone's job responsibilities. While
there might be a designated professional staff member or
campus department whose primary focus is leading
assessment charges, a comprehensive assessment practice
needs to include all of us in some capacity. This
acknowledgement during the meeting led us to our next
question - what is the role and functionality of assessment,
including an assessment committee, in a housing/residence
life department?
Professionals at different institutions across the
state of Florida would like to share with you some
prospective, insight, information, and practical
assessment approaches used at our respective
institutions. Our hope is to reframe how we engage with
assessment and provide tangible take-aways for our
fellow SEAHO colleagues. Please reach out to any of our
collaborating FHO members listed at the end of the
article for any additional questions, inquiries, etc.
How Does Assessment Show Up?
For this article, our definition of assessment
stems from Upcraft and Schuh (1996): " Assessment
is...any effort to gather, analyze, and interpret evidence
that describes institutional, departmental, divisional, or
agency effectiveness. " The type of assessment that we
do in our work may assist in strategic planning
processes, informing decisions, securing resources,
pinpointing issues to inform practice, hold ourselves
accountable to what our objectives strive to accomplish,
determine cost effectiveness, indicate needs, measure
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RECOMMENDATIONS/MANTRAS:
▪Before committing to an assessment
project, know your purpose
▪In our roles, focus on learning first -
satisfaction second.
▪Do not assess everything all the time. Be
strategic. Coordinate assessment into
manageable and digestible chunks.
▪Focus on useful data, rather than
interesting.
▪Expect to spend time on data and
storytelling - more than you think.
▪Start small. Plan less than you think you
can manage.
▪Do not ask assessment questions you do
not want the answers to. Do not ask
questions about things you cannot
change.
▪Utilize existing data that is already out
there - no need to double-dip.
▪Doing something is better than doing
nothing...unless you do not use it. Data is
not an egg, you can't just sit on it. Collect
data, report it out, share what you're
going to do with it, and then do
something with it.
▪Create an assessment calendar - include
timelines.
▪Assessment aesthetics - data
visualization is key! Play around with
platforms like Canva, Vimeo, and
Piktochart.
▪ " Frame assessment as an opportunity to
advocate for change and additional
resources. " - Paul Gordon Brown
SEAHO Report - Winter 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of SEAHO Report - Winter 2022
