In order to expedite application of data gathered in the course of AQIP activity to HLC's five accreditation criteria, the Commission issued the following crosswalk to indicate some of the possible alignments between AQIP categories and HLC criteria.
AQIP Category*
The Commission’s Criteria for Accreditation 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Criterion One: Mission and Integrity.
The organization operates with integrity to ensure the fulfillment of its mission through structures and processes that involve the board, administration, faculty, staff, and students.
X X X X X
Criterion Two: Preparing for the Future
The organization’s allocation of resources and its processes for evaluation and planning demonstrate its capacity to fulfill its mission, improve the quality of its education, and respond to future challenges and opportunities.
X X X X X
Criterion Three: Student Learning and Effective Teaching
The organization provides evidence of student learning and teaching effectiveness that demonstrates it is fulfilling its educational mission.
X X X X X
Criterion Four: Acquisition, Discover, and Application of Knowledge
The organization promotes a life of learning for its faculty, administration, staff, and students by fostering and supporting inquiry, creativity, practice, and social responsibility in ways consistent with its mission.
X X X
X
X
Criterion Five: Engagement and Service
As called for by its mission, the organization identifies its
constituencies and serves them in ways both value. X X X X X
*Key to the nine AQIP categories: Helping Students Learn
Accomplishing Other Distinctive Objectives
Understanding Students' and Other Stakeholders' Needs Valuing People
Leading and Communicating Supporting Institutional Operations Measuring Effectiveness
Planning Continuous Improvement Building Collaborative Relationships
The following table, which is based on information drawn from AQIP publications, provides examples of the extent to which AQIP activities projects [col. 3] lend themselves to evaluation in the context of Iowa's
accreditation criteria and core components. The table includes AQIP categories [col. 1] and alignments of Iowa criteria and core components [col. 5], along with their respective identification numbers [cols. 2 and 4]. All text copyright Higher Learning Commission.
[1] AQIP category [2] # [3] Focus of potential AQIP action projects
[4]
#
[5]
Iowa accreditation criterion and core component
Helping Students Learn 1 Strengthening educational effectiveness, assessment, and evaluation
3a The college’s goals for student learning outcomes are clearly stated for each educational program and make effective assessment possible. Helping Students Learn 1 Measuring, analyzing, observing,
tracking, recording, and grading student academic achievement, in individual courses, in degree programs, and in co-curricular contexts for institutional improvement
3a The college’s goals for student learning outcomes are clearly stated for each educational program and make effective assessment possible. Helping Students Learn 1 Delivering instruction and
encouraging and promoting academic and other forms of student development, in and out of the classroom
3c The college creates effective learning environments.
Helping Students Learn 1 Developing, staffing, delivering, supporting, scheduling, evaluating, ordering, retiring, and revising credit courses, continuing education and special instructional activities
4c The college assesses the usefulness of its curricula to students who will live and work in a global, diverse, and
technological society. Understanding Students'
and Other Stakeholders' Needs
3 Establishing, articulating, publicizing, maintaining, and reviewing targets for student performance (learning, behaviors, values, activities, etc.)
3a The college’s goals for student learning outcomes are clearly stated for each educational program and make effective assessment possible. Understanding Students'
and Other Stakeholders' Needs
3 Forming and using advisory
committees 5a The college learns from the constituencies it serves and analyzes its capacity to serve their needs and expectations.
Understanding Students' and Other Stakeholders' Needs
3 Communicating to the public 5b The college has the capacity and the commitment to engage with its identified constituencies and communities.
Understanding Students' and Other Stakeholders' Needs
3 Maintaining useful relationships with students, former students, and other stakeholders
5c The college demonstrates its responsiveness to those
constituencies that depend on it for services.
Valuing People 4 Designing, organizing, and managing work and jobs to promote individual initiative, cooperation, collaboration, innovation, and flexibility while keeping current with educational and instructional needs
1d The college’s governance and administrative structures promote effective leadership and support collaborative processes that enable the college to fulfill its mission.
[1] AQIP category [2] # [3] Focus of potential AQIP action projects
[4]
#
[5]
Iowa accreditation criterion and core component
Valuing People 4 Identifying, recruiting, selecting, hiring, orienting, training, developing, assigning, evaluating, retaining, replacing, and dismissing academic staff, support staff, administrative staff, volunteers, interns, etc.
3c The college creates effective learning environments.
Leading and
Communicating 5 Communicating philosophy, values, and objectives to mission, all members of the institution, and for making certain those values underlie all decisions
1a The college’s mission documents are clear and articulate publicly the college’s commitments.
Supporting Institutional Operations
6 Providing institutional support services (e.g., accounting, maintenance, purchasing, risk management)
2b The college’s resource base supports its educational programs and its plans for maintaining and strengthening their quality in the future.
Supporting Institutional Operations
6 Establishing, maintaining, and improving administrative institutional support programs
3c The college creates effective learning environments. Measuring Effectiveness 7 Examining all processes related to
the information it does or might collect or use
2c The college’s ongoing evaluation and assessment processes provide reliable evidence of institutional effectiveness that clearly informs strategies for continuous improvement.
Measuring Effectiveness 7 Gathering, maintaining, and making available a variety of information it collects to those who need it, including data on students and other stakeholder groups; data on
institutional programs, academic and other; data on the performance of institutional operations and processes; and information concerning students, stakeholder groups, programs, and performance in comparable institutions
2c The college’s ongoing evaluation and assessment processes provide reliable evidence of institutional effectiveness that clearly informs strategies for continuous improvement.
Measuring Effectiveness 7 Selecting, managing, and using information and data to support overall institution goals, with strong emphasis on action plans and performance improvement
2c The college’s ongoing evaluation and assessment processes provide reliable evidence of institutional effectiveness that clearly informs strategies for continuous improvement.
Planning Continuous
Improvement 8 Establishing operational plans and performance targets for academic programs, academic support programs, and institutional support programs
2a The college realistically prepares for a future shaped by multiple societal and economic trends. Building Collaborative
Relationships 9 Promoting, monitoring, and evaluating internal responsiveness, cooperation, and collaboration
5a The college learns from the constituencies it serves and analyzes its capacity to serve their needs and expectations.
Building Collaborative