Program

Kitchen Table Talks: Trusting Students to Facilitate Learning (10:30-10:50)

Stephanie Hernandez Rivera, Elon University

Creating spaces for students to understand their place in their learning and that of their peers is important in a critically engaged classroom. This talk explores the practice of “Kitchen Table Talks” as a course assignment and the ways that Kitchen Table Talks encourage students to facilitate learning for their peers and assess their engagement. Furthermore, the talk underscores how educators can use their epistemological perspective to creatively develop assignments for their courses that align with their epistemology and pedagogical practice.

Co-designing inclusive and authentic assessment: A students-as-partners approach (11:00-11:20)

Katie Lee Bunting, Elly Park, Nicole Arsenault, Savanah Miles, Laura Yvonne Bulk & Alexis Davis, University of British Columbia

The students-as-partners approach is transforming assessment by fostering inclusive learning, increasing student agency, and deepening engagement. Our team—two student partners and four educators— co-designed a graduate health professions class on anti-oppressive practice. We centered an authentic assessment approach by co-creating case scenarios to assess students’ application of learned strategies, ensuring diverse perspectives and appropriate complexity. Educators facilitated critical discussions in class and the team as a whole provided targeted feedback, reinforcing learning. This session will explore using co-created assessments, student voice in design, and equitable partnerships. Participants will leave with strategies to embed students-as-partners in their own assessment practices.

If They Build It, They Will Come: Empowering Students to Design the Assignment (10:30-10:50)

Sarah Jacoba & Carmen Wessel, Lakehead University 

At most institutions of higher education, student feedback surveys and metrics are developed and deployed by central offices, and carry significant weight in contract renewal, reappointment, promote, tenure, and more. As educators, we know that student survey data is just one form of feedback on teaching. Instructor-created instruments – especially midcourse surveys – offer important midsemester actionable feedback allowing for minor curricular shifts to reconnect student learning and motivation. This interactive workshop demonstrates the value of mapping a college course in the Taxonomy Table (Anderson, et al.) as a necessary first step to help faculty build more effective mid-term student feedback surveys.

A Linguistically Just Approach to Assessment: Students as Collaborative Partners (11:00-11:20)

Catherine Bowlin, Elon University 

This session will explore an alternative assessment model that invites students into the assessment process by collaborating in the development, feedback, and reflection phases of projects. This assessment schema prompts students to collaboratively write learning objectives, provide feedback, enact revisions, write grading checklists for final submissions, and reflect on final submissions to assess themselves. Participants will consider how a student-inclusive assessment model can build confidence, trust, agency, and authentic learning in any higher ed context. Participants will also reflect on potential adjustments to their own assessment practices to prioritize a linguistically just framework in the classroom.

Adult Learners as Collaborators: Developing ELT Educators’ Critical AI Literacy (10:30-10:50)

Plamen Kushkiev, George Brown College

This presentation explores the affordances of ChatGPT as a critical friend in developing adult educators’ critical AI literacy (CAIL) in English language teaching (ELT). Based on a three-semester narrative inquiry in an Ontario community college, the study examines the researcher’s perceptions of CAIL, pedagogical interventions, and AI-mediated assessment design. Thematic analysis of journal entries and ChatGPT interactions highlights how critical engagement with GenAI fosters human-focused pedagogy, learner collaboration, and formative assessment as learning. Findings emphasize the need for ELT educators to develop CAIL, adapt AI-mediated approaches, and empower learners as co-creators of knowledge in AI-enhanced multilingual classrooms.

Navigating the New Norm: Partnering with AI for Assessment (11:00-11:20)

Becky Kloepfer, Kendra Nanton, & Dhvani Toprani, Elon University 

As AI tools become more accessible in higher education, faculty face both excitement and uncertainty about their use. While AI offers productivity gains, concerns about authentic learning remain. Elon University’s Learning Design and Support Team developed a workshop supporting faculty in exploring generative AI for student-centered assessment design using student-as-partners approach. Rather than positioning ourselves as AI experts, we fostered collaborative experimentation to discover innovative assessment and engagement strategies. Students supported this initiative by presenting their needs and AI perceptions to faculty. This session shares key takeaways from the workshop and invites new perspectives on partnering with faculty to integrate AI intentionally into assessment practices.

Design Thinking Assessment for Wicked Problems (10:30-10:50)

Danielle Lake, John Cirelli, & Peyton Patrick, Elon University; Heather Keith, Radford University 

This session will document the findings and provide recommendations for boundary-spanning curricula designed to prepare students to address wicked problems. In particular, facilitators will document Radford University’s wicked problems curricular initiative, an ecosystems approach to assessment, and the teaching and learning strategies found to be most valuable. Radford’s 5-year pilot initiative includes innovative curricula, co-curricular programming, and new student associations. It also spans the university, transforming student involvement in real world problem-solving. To study the merits and limitations, Elon’s Center for Design Thinking created an ecosystem approach to assessment, including a review of materials, faculty interviews, student focus groups, surveys, and a site visit.

Reimagining Assessment in Experiential Learning: Contracts, collaboration, and care (11:00-11:20)

Jessica Mace & Ainsley Goldman, University of Toronto 

What happens when you combine two innovative pedagogies, experiential learning and contract grading? This presentation shares research findings from a case study of an upper-year undergraduate humanities course that coupled an industry project with a contract grading assessment model. Our findings demonstrate the impact that it had on students: it helped them to thrive individually, but also perhaps more significantly, it built community, collaboration, and trust. While not a one-size-fits-all approach, we share key lessons from this innovative method of grading experiential learning that may be applied to a broad range of courses.

Reflective Writing as Authentic Assessment: Strategies and Frameworks for Using Metacognitive Responses to Assess Experiential and Integrative Learning (10:30-11:20)

Shelley Reid & Tom Polk, George Mason University 

This workshop will introduce faculty to strategies for designing, teaching, and especially assessing reflective assignments in their class, internship, capstone experience, or co-curricular learning environment. The workshop builds on research that demonstrates that metacognitive assignments help learning “stick” with students and transfer to other classes and professional sites. Participants from all disciplines are invited to explore frameworks for deciding when and how to guide students’ reflective learning; participants will have time to adapt their own assignments and assessment criteria in light of these frameworks.

Assessing for Hope and Agency in a new Environment Degree

Noah Martin, Keaton Nara, Jesse Meiller & Susannah McGowan, Georgetown University (10:30-11:20)

Georgetown University launched a new degree, BS in Environment and Sustainability, in 2024. This degree responds to the urgency and complexity of the environmental crisis through interdisciplinary learning experiences that teach students to analyze human impact across sectors, advance sustainable practices, and to be good stewards of the planet. In order to respond to this urgency, the curriculum designers (faculty, staff, and students) needed to develop assessments aimed to measure specific competencies which included: ways of thinking, ways of knowing, and ways of acting. “Ways of acting” includes developing students’ dispositions around hope, agency, and innovation. We aim to invite colleagues into a co-analysis of our assessments to determine how and where to look for student learning within their actions.

Ultimate UDL Project: Collaborating with Students on Course Redesign (11:30-11:50)

Ellen Swider, Goodwin University

Universal Design for Learning is a powerful tool, but what if it could be made even better? By integrating UDL with Culturally Responsive Teaching, designers can create cultural authenticity and accessible curriculum for diverse learners. This case study examines how faculty collaborated with students and utilized UDL and CRT to redesign an African American history course.

Co-Creating Role-Playing Games: Teaching, Research, and Mentorship (12:00-12:20)

Yidi Wu & Alexandra James, Elon University

Dr. Yidi Wu is collaborating with Alexandra James ‘26 to develop the role-playing game centered around the dialogues in 1989’s Tian’anmen Protests. Alexandra, who has taken Dr. Wu’s modern Chinese history and possesses Chinese language skills, will research and create comprehensive role sheets and faction guides, as well as translating and annotating relevant primary sources. The project will culminate in a pilot game involving student volunteers, allowing us to test the effectiveness of the role sheets and game mechanics. This session will share the role-playing game creation process and reflect on the collaboration experience.

Building Blocks to a Stronger Final Project

Peggy Kerr, Gwynedd Mercy University (11:30-11:50)

Multimodality meets the demands of an increasingly complex world and the needs and aspirations of an increasingly diverse group of learners in higher education. Focusing on multimodality in summative assessment, where inequities are an enduring concern, a faculty member and three students share uses of multimodality in the portfolios the students completed as summative assessment for an undergraduate education course. Guided by intention (to present a nuanced analysis), preference (as the most effective mode of expression for her), and necessity (because of a concussion), these students’ choices reflect self-empowerment, model diversity in expression, and foreground attention to equity and wellbeing.

Assessing the Unseen: Effective Metrics for Immersive Learning Success (12:00-12:20)

Jennifer Blush & Michelle Corvette, Ph.D., William Peace University

This session explores how to measure the effectiveness of assessments and feedback in supporting student growth within immersive learning environments. Building on our University’s Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP), we will discuss key metrics for evaluating teaching impact and student outcomes. The session will focus on holistic scoring, performance-based assessments, and feedback strategies that foster a growth mindset. Participants will learn how to design and evaluate assessments that align with immersive learning goals, ensuring students develop problem-solving and collaboration skills essential for lifelong learning. We will also examine innovative assessment methods, such as immersive assessments and alternative performance assessments, which provide more accurate measurements of learner progress and engagement. The session aims to enhance teaching practices and student success through data-driven approaches, emphasizing the importance of real-time feedback and adaptive learning paths in immersive environments.

Argument, Research, and the Video Essay (11:30-11:50)

Maggie Kelly & Andrew Bacon, Elon University

The video essay is quickly becoming a popular mode of research and argument in this digital age. This information session will explore the dynamics of a video essay project for Elon English 1100 students. From the pedagogical benefits of digital arguments to the technical intricacies of teaching students video production skills, Maggie Kelly (assistant professor of English) and Andrew Bacon (video producer for Elon) will share their experiences of collaborating to help ENG 1100 students create well-researched argumentative video essays about cultural artifacts.

Ignite, Interact, Impact: Measuring student engagement in online courses through interactive assessments (12:00-12:20)

Amber Williams & Jon Mladic, Blackhawk Technical College

Fostering a community of engagement and collaboration in any classroom can be a challenge, yet even more so in an online modality. Join us for a session that will highlight best practices in online classroom engagement, provide small interactive assessments that can be implemented quickly and easily, and discover how the utilize the analytics in a course to measure its results.

Making the Assessment Procedure Resemble the Learning Process: Achieving Transparency and Reducing Anxiety through Mastery Grading (11:30-12:20)

Michael Callahan & Theo Greer, Michigan State University

Are you seeking a grading system that normalizes and rewards the persistence and repeated attempts that learning requires? Workshop participants will learn the main features and potential benefits of Mastery Grading (MG); they will acquire a list of tips, pitfalls, and considerations that are important to foreground when implementing MG, drawn from the results of a mixed-methods study that assessed student mindsets and self-management behaviors, instructor behaviors, and student success in a required undergraduate skills course with MG during fall 2024; and they will sketch the beginnings of an evidence-based MG implementation within their own specific pedagogical discipline.

Live Actor Role-Play Simulation as an Authentic (and AI proof!) Assessment Practice (11:30-11:50)

Lauren Spring, Conestoga College

Live actor role-play simulation has a long history in post-secondary education, enhancing clinical skills and communication abilities in health sciences and medical education. It is also used in policing education to simulate high-stress scenarios, aiding future officers in decision-making and de-escalation. The success of live actor role-play has led to its adoption in other disciplines such as business, social work, law, education, and hospitality. This presentation focuses on ways that live-actor simulation is being incorporated into courses at Conestoga College across various disciplines including culinary arts, auto mechanics, interdisciplinary studies, social services, and paramedics as authentic assessments that align with course learning outcomes and are resistant to AI manipulation.

Assess, Engage, Achieve: PowerPoint and Google Slides as Your Assessment Allies (12:00-12:20)

Shawn R. Cradit, North Carolina State University

This session explores how digital tools like PowerPoint and Google Slides enhance student assessments in both academic and fitness settings. By integrating these platforms into activity and lecture classes, educators create interactive, engaging assessments that go beyond traditional methods like tests, quizzes, and worksheets. In fitness testing, these tools complement traditional methods and innovative approaches, such as water-based tests and Functional Movement Screen (FMS), enabling a more dynamic evaluation that the students appreciate. This integration fosters deeper student engagement, improves learning outcomes, and provides diverse, accessible ways to assess progress effectively.

Partnering with Students: Leveraging Mid-Semester Surveys and Focus Groups for Teaching Improvement (11:30-12:20)

Henrietta Paz-Amor, New York University

Our team of student partners from the NYU Student Faculty Partners Program (SFPP) formulated, collected, and presented student feedback to faculty partners to help improve class experiences. In this workshop, our team – including several participating students – will guide participants through a thought-provoking discussion about collecting student feedback to improve classroom engagement. This workshop will include best practices for mid-semester surveys, hands-on experiences, and a small group breakout session. Join us to get a taste of collecting student feedback and applying gathered data to improve student learning in your class, as well as the opportunity to learn from the students involved.

Inquiry Learning Performance Assessment (12:30-12:50)

Lee Anna Stirling, Thomas College

“…large numbers of college seniors are leaving college with a very weak grasp of how to use evidence to build a well-supported argument.” (Schneider, 2017, p.47)
To overcome this deficit, inquiry learning, as part of all college and graduate courses’ curriculum, is needed – at least for a week and half or two week unit. Effective inquiry includes structures/scaffolds while students are guided in learning to create their own inquiry structures. For effective inquiry learning, students engage in inquiry to learn about a topic of interest. Participants will learn how to incorporate inquiry learning into courses they are teaching. They will be shown and receive a link to an Inquiry Planning Template, the presenter has created for her students and view slides that illustrate the inquiry process and how to facilitate students’ implementation of it.

Case-based authentic assessment (1:00-1:20)

Kim Stokes, Elon University

Developing healthcare providers is challenging, as success is often measured by standardized multiple-choice exams. Learners accustomed to these exams prefer knowing what will be tested and find comfort in multiple-choice options, rather than applying knowledge and critical reasoning. With the shift towards competency-based education, it’s crucial to design assessments that engage learners and allow skill mastery with feedback. Authentic assessment, cited in various disciplines, supports this approach. This presentation showcases learning outcomes from a course using mapped, case-based questions and a scoring rubric, enabling instructors to provide personalized, skill-specific feedback.

Co-Designing Honors Theses: Partnering with Undergraduate Students for Meaningful Learning (12:30-1:20)

Jordan Hazelwood, Kathryn R. Long, Stacy F. Thornton & Christopher M. Seiz, Appalachian State University

​​This interactive workshop explores how faculty and students can co-design in honors theses, transforming traditional assessment into a meaningful learning experience. Drawing on evidence-based practices and firsthand experiences from our team of faculty mentors and recent honors graduates, participants will learn strategies for effective student-faculty research partnerships. Through guided activities that model collaborative co-design, attendees will explore the benefits and challenges of this approach while developing practical implementation plans for their own disciplines. This session will share how co-designing thesis projects with students creates more equitable, innovative assessments that enhance learning outcomes while building students’ research confidence and professional identity.

We Tried to Create Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI) Jeopardy and Failed, Here’s Why (12:30-1:20)

Kimberly Springfield & Matthew Kilbride, Montgomery County Community College

Two instructional designers recount their failure to create a jeopardy game that focused on types of assessments and their susceptibility to generative artificial intelligence. Ultimately, what began as an excitable goal ended in a face plant, but the lessons learned are important for every classroom interested moving higher education forward in our new post-AI world.

Exams as Teaching Tools: Two Methods (12:30-12:50)

Cora Wigger & Olivia Healy, Elon University

In this project, we review the use of course exams as learning tools beyond their use as assessments, alone. We present two methods of exam review, comparing and contrasting their appropriateness for different learning contexts. In the first, students are incentivized to review and correct their work. In the second, students engage in a collective discussion after exams with the option to re-take portions of their exam. We discuss the benefits and drawbacks of each approach and describe how to choose an appropriate method based on learning objectives.

Beyond the Traditional Exam: An Alternative Assessment Shown to Increase Student Success (1:00-1:20)

Mary Ritchey, Penn State York

Traditional assessments, especially in STEM fields, focus on solving problems. However, due to student test taking anxieties or lower/slower math abilities, particularly on timed assessments, the traditional assessment may not effectively evaluate a student’s full knowledge or critical thinking skills. Therefore, this session looks at an alternative assessment strategy where students, as part of their exams, create videos teaching key concepts and rationales involved in solving complex problems. This not only allows for a more equitable and inclusive way for students to express their understanding, but it also leads to increased knowledge retention as evaluated on the final exam.

Trust and assessment: Building trust to enable authentic and equitable assessments (12:30-1:20)

Jill McSweeney & Peter Felten, Elon University

Trust is important in the development of educational relationships, impacting student learning, motivation, well-being and degree completion in higher education (e.g., Sutherland et al., 2024). If students do not trust their instructors, their peers, and/or the assessment processes, their stress is likely to be high and performance low. Sharing data from a 4-country, 6-university (including Elon) project, we will explore four primary “pathways” of trust related to assessments and engage participants in reflecting on their own trust building practices and developing plans for building trust through their teaching and assessments.

Communicate to Collaborate: Building rapport to obtain productive classroom feedback (12:30-12:50)

Christiana Bevier, Purdue University Global

In the online environment instructors can foster collaborative feedback through successful communication. This can build rapport, timely responses, and useful feedback. Throughout class, an instructor can utilize various forms of communication to obtain feedback from students to help with the redesign of specific content, or the entire class. In cases where it is not possible to redesign a course, an instructor can utilize feedback to make a positive change to best serve students. This presentation will include both experience and research to explore how communication with students can aid in successful collaboration for potential course changes.

Alternative Assessment Methods to Enhance Critical Thinking and Meaning-Making: An Inclusive and Transformative Approach (1:00-1:20)

Hatice Merve Caliskan Baser, Izmir Katip Çelebi University, Turkey

In a rapidly changing world driven by technological advancements, the gap between educators and students is widening, making it difficult to establish a common language of learning. To engage students actively, dynamic and thought-provoking experiences are needed. This session explores how to integrate various materials—films, news articles, museum visits, and explorations—into assessment strategies to create an interactive and effective learning experience. The approach encourages critical thinking, creativity, and problem-solving skills by bridging historical and contemporary issues. It emphasizes innovation in assessment, fostering a more inclusive, engaging, and impactful learning process that transcends traditional methods.