For students stressed about upcoming examinations and papers, Donald Feke feels your pain.
The university’s vice provost for undergraduate education, Feke has led a team of faculty and staff through the arduous, exhaustive process of preparing for Case Western Reserve’s biggest test—a comprehensive external evaluation of institutional quality that takes place every 10 years. Thanks to their collective efforts, the university has gathered and submitted all of the information required in advance of the on-campus review. Next month, the examiners arrive for two days of meetings aimed at learning more about the university and its people.
The five-member team will be at Case Western Reserve April 13 and 14. Several of their sessions will be open to the public, and details regarding time and place will be available as soon as they are final.
As part of the review, Feke collected reams of data and information and compiled them into the submission the university makes to the accrediting agency for this region, the Higher Learning Commission (HLC). Prior to the submission of “assurance arguments,” the university posted drafts online and asked for community comment. The final submission can be found online.
“We are grateful to those who took the time to contact us with corrections, clarifications and broader comments,” Feke said. “The documents the Commission received are much stronger as a result of the community’s broad participation.”
The HLC’s required preparations also involved distribution of an online survey to all undergraduate, graduate and professional students. More than 2,000 responded during the weeklong February window, and the quantitative results can be found on the same page as the assurance argument, case.edu/provost/accreditation. Feke said that university leaders are reviewing this data along with written comments, and have begun developing actions to address key concerns and requests.
“Our students did an outstanding job of detailing areas that work well for them as well as those that need improvement,” Feke said. “The responses have been extremely helpful as we work to make this campus a better learning environment for all of them.”
Feke emphasized that he hopes students also participate in the open meetings the university will host when the HLC representatives are on campus next month—whether or not they already completed the survey. The representatives come from member institutions within the HLC.
These sessions provide an opportunity to learn about specific parts of the university, and to share their perspectives with outside reviewers. Feke also encouraged staff and faculty to attend the open sessions, which are expected to cover topics ranging from the quality and assessment of teaching and learning to the allocation of resources to efforts to advance the university’s mission.
The university will announce the topics, dates and times for those meetings in the near future, both in the daily and in other online locations.