Center for Practices with Electronic Portfolios and Assessment

The primary focus of the Center will be the development and demonstration of a knowledge base on innovative technology-supported assessment practices to:

Improve individual learning
Foster positive changes in individual courses, academic programs and office services
Improve institution-level performance

Assessment Partnership

CEPA will provide a formal framework for partnership among SCT, Nuventive, and WMU for a four year period (2005-2009), which can be extended by mutual consent.

This partnership will allow SCT, Nuventive, and the University to demonstrate best assessment practices with the deployment and adoption of electronic portfolios along with the integration of these solutions within WMU's Unified Digital Campus (powered by SunGard SCT). Additionally, this partnership will enable WMU to adopt a continuous model of institutional assessment improvement and, as a national and public higher education institution using SCT Unified Digital Campus solutions including SCT TracDat by Nuventive and iWebfolio, to demonstrate how the effective use of scarce resources within a partnership positively impacts student learning outcomes.

SCT and Nuventive believe that their partnership with WMU will offer other institutions a demonstration model and insight into competing considerations when deciding whether to adopt these two solutions as part of an integrated, enterprise-wide assessment system.

Assessment practices involving technology will enable institutions to:

Focus institutional resources on methods, techniques, and tools with the highest return for students, faculty, and the institution
Lessen the human time and repetitive documentation requirements associated with the multiple assessment and accreditation mandates placed upon academic programs by external bodies and agencies
Improve instructional learning outcomes for student