The clinical practice project aligns with standards 1,3,4,6 and 8.

Standard 1: Clinical practice provides an opportunity for students to use content knowledge as they practice and improve skills that involve planning experiences for a variety of populations and skills that involve collaboration and cooperative efforts with diverse groups of people both in the education setting and in the community.

This experience required students to use their content knowledge regarding the particular sport that was the focus of the tournament. Additionally, they were expected to plan and

implement a program that was open to the general public. It would model current practice for tournaments in that sport, fairness and sportsmanship in the planning and conducting of the tournament, and encourage a variety of participants to be physically activity in an enjoyable atmosphere.

Standard 3: The project required students to devise a tournament that would be based on the accepted rules of the sport, hire officials that would fairly conduct the tournament, and devise an appropriate list of local rules for the tournament that demonstrated fairness and encouraged ethical conduct both by the students conducting the tournament as well as the participants. A tournament rules committee was responsible for setting and enforcing local rules where they differed from accepted rules of the sport. The rules committee was also required to handle any protests, breach of tournament rules and misconduct of participants or fans.

Standard 4: The clinical practice provided an opportunity for students to experience first hand the results of making decisions that were not considered to be fair and ethical to all participants. Since the tournament was a team tournament, families were present, fans with a great deal of knowledge and some with very little knowledge were present and everyone wanted an opportunity to compete on a level playing field.

Conducting the tournament appropriately provided students with the opportunities to arrange the activities so that sound teaching practices were utilized both with the participants and with other class members as the tournament was planned.

Standard 6: This clinical practice provided an opportunity for students to plan and conduct a sports event that was open to the general public. The planning and implementation required tremendous cooperation between the individual class members as they planned, publicized, and solicited sponsors and participants for the event. The city recreational leaders, officials,

tournament sponsors and team representatives were a diverse group who were vitally interested in promoting physical activity, except the sponsors who were interested in promoting their business.

Standard 8: The tournament required students to collaborate with a diverse group of persons. Facilities required dealing with city recreational leaders, publicity required dealing with the university public relations department, local media outlets, and surrounding recreation facilities, solicitation of sponsors required dealing with area businesses, concessions required dealing with local merchants, and finally, the participating teams required dealing with a diverse group of persons.

Since this clinical practice was advertised as being sponsored by the graduate students at DSU, students were made aware of the importance of conducting themselves appropriately and projecting a professional image during all phases of planning and implementing the tournament.

Having applied the skills needed to conduct this practice, all the students reflected that the next tournament would be easier to conduct and that they felt that they could do a better job and would alter some of the procedures so they would apply to specific populations. All students participating in the clinical practice had participated in sports tournaments previously, but only one had been actively involved in planning and conducting one. Reflections of the students indicated a very positive experience that, to a person, provided the practical experience that was the purpose of the clinical practice.

3. A brief analysis of the data indicated that the majority of the students completed the practice at the acceptable or target level. During the spring ’06 term 20 percent of the students functioned at the marginally acceptable level. These students either did not shoulder their part of the project or were ineffective in parts of the project. This percentage increased to 30 percent during the summer term of ’06 for essentially the same reasons.

4. Considering how well the clinical practice aligned with the designated standards, student performance at the acceptable and target levels indicated very positive evidence of appropriate performance on the clinical practice. While data obtained from the reflections of the clinical practice are not reported in this document, they indicated a very positive experience even from those students who performed at the marginally acceptable level. This practice was/is

particularly important as a tool to allow students to practice and improve their skills who enter the graduate program directly from an undergraduate program with no teaching or work experience.

Attachments of assessment documentation for Assessment # 4 Attachment (a)

Description of the assignment

This description is included in the course syllabus for PER 611 Current Literature and Tends in Physical education.

Clinical Practice:

In the clinical practice project, students will plan, implement and evaluate a sports tournament sponsored by the graduate HPER majors.

Students will function as a class to determine project leadership, committee assignments, tournament guidelines and local rules.

Leadership will include tournament co-directors and committee chairpersons

All students will participate on the planning, the publicity, and the sponsor committee. All students will participate on at least one of the following committees; concessions, trophies and awards, game management, protest, tournament organization (brackets), tournament signs, and tournament and sponsor follow-up.

During the spring term, the tournament will typically be a 16 team slow pitch double elimination softball tournament. Due to time limitations, the tournament for the summer term will be a parent/child golf tournament.

The softball tournament will be held on the city softball facilities. Arrangements must be made with the city recreational leaders concerning available dates, costs and requirements. The golf tournament will be held on the DSU golf course with the same arrangement requirements being necessary with the DSU golf personnel.

Attachments of assessment documentation for Assessment # 4 Attachment (b)

Scoring rubric

name 1 Unacceptable 2 Marginally