The following is a summary of the results for Academic Year 2009-2010 of the assessments of computer competency in courses CGS2060, CGS2100, CGS3406, COP3014, and COP4530.
We are satisfied with this success rate, given that inevitably there are a few students who fail a course or informally drop out before completing the assessment assignment. We conjecture that higher passing rate in spring term might be due to students attending in the Spring term were more experienced than fall term students. However, we also are concerned about the possibility of plagiarism, since we re-used the same assignment both terms.
Assignments will be modified to prevent plagiarism.
Summer data not reported.
We are satisfied with this on-campus success rate, given that inevitably there are a few students who fail a course or informally drop out before completing the assessment assignment. However, we have not been able to obtain data for sections of CGS2100 that were offered by FSU International Programs. Apparently, the International Programs Office did not inform the department that they were offering those sections, and so the department did not inform the instructor that it would be necessary to collect the assessment data.
The Director of International Programs has been requested to notify the department of such offerings of computer competency courses, in advance, so that the department can educate the instructor regarding SACS assessment requirements for the course.
Summer data not reported.
Summer data not reported.
This is an introductory programming course with 6 programming assignments of increasing difficulty as the term goes on. Every programming assignment, even the simplest, requires every student to (1) use a specific software package applicable to the student's discipoline; this is the Microsoft Visual Studio Express 2008 Integrated Development Environment, and (2) perform one or more of the following transactions using the web/Internet: submit an assignment electronically, access course-related material: ALL students must turn in EVERY programming assignment using the Internet, i.e. Blackboard and the class web site, and must obtain ALL course materials from this web site as well. Thus if a student has been able to complete and turn in any of the 6 programming assignments, he or she has fulfilled the statement of what the computer competency requirement entails.
The instructor chose to look at the score for program 6 in these two semesters. Program 6 is the hardest and most difficult program of the term, and requires far, far beyond what the computer competency requirement requires. In essence students have to have a great deal of computer programming skill, specifically, to earn a passing grade on this assignment. This explains the results of how many achieved 70% or higher on program 6.
This course is similar to COP3014, but intended for students in non-technical majors. As a consequence it does not go quite as far as COP3014, but it still has a stricter performance standard for passing the course that is required to merely demonstrate computer competency.
In all introductory programming classes, it is often the case that students quit coming to class and quit turning anything it at some point during the semester, and yet they still remain registered, instead of dropping the course. This explains why in both semesters quite a few students did not turn in project 6.
The instructor originally chose to use program 6 as the "capstone assignment" because the meaning of "capstone assignment" in a software development class in computer science typically means the hardest, longest, most challenging programming assignment of a semester. In restrospect, it is clear that this was not the meaning intended for computer competency assessment. In future terms we should utilize a different programming assignment to assess computer competency in this course. The computer competency skill can be met with one of the earlier course assignments. Program 6 brings in a level of difficulty in computer programming which is not helpful in understanding the overall statistics, as it goes much too far beyond the "competency" level.
Summer data not reported.
Summer data not reported.
This is an introductory programming course with 6 programming assignments of increasing difficulty as the term goes on. Every programming assignment, even the simplest, requires every student to (1) use a specific software package applicable to the student's discipoline; this is the Microsoft Visual Studio Express 2008 Integrated Development Environment, and (2) perform one or more of the following transactions using the web/Internet: submit an assignment electronically, access course-related material: ALL students must turn in EVERY programming assignment using the Internet, i.e. Blackboard and the class web site, and must obtain ALL course materials from this web site as well. Thus if a student has been able to complete and turn in any of the 6 programming assignments, he or she has fulfilled the statement of what the computer competency requirement entails.
The instructor chose to look at the score for program 6 in these two semesters. Program 6 is the hardest and most difficult program of the term, and requires far, far beyond what the computer competency requirement requires. In essence students have to have a great deal of computer programming skill, specifically, to earn a passing grade on this assignment. This explains the results of how many achieved 70% or higher on program 6.
Note that this course serves as a gateway to more advanced courses in computer science, and so has a rather strict performance standard for passing the course -- stricter than would be required to merely demonstrate computer competency.
In all introductory programming classes, it is often the case that students quit coming to class and quit turning anything it at some point during the semester, and yet they still remain registered, instead of dropping the course. This explains why in both semesters quite a few students did not turn in project 6.
The instructor originally chose to use program 6 as the "capstone assignment" because the meaning of "capstone assignment" in a software development class in computer science typically means the hardest, longest, most challenging programming assignment of a semester. In restrospect, it is clear that this was not the meaning intended for computer competency assessment. In future terms we should utilize a different programming assignment to assess computer competency in this course. The computer competency skill can be met with one of the earlier course assignments. Program 6 brings in a level of difficulty in computer programming which is not helpful in understanding the overall statistics, as it goes much too far beyond the "competency" level.
We have asked Dr. Lacher for the Spring 2010 distance learning and Panama City Campus offerings of this course, but have not yet received them. However, based on the observation below, we expect that the students in that section all achieved this outcome.
Students performed very well for both objectives. All students were able to use the basic options/commands of make and g++ to organize and compile their projects, and submit assignments online via the blackboard system.
Based on what we have observed, and the pre-requisites of this course, all students taking this course can easily satisfy these requirements. Testing for computer competency in this course is redundant, since the prerequisitie COP3014 is also a computer competency course. Therefore, the department has decided to drop COP4530 from the list of courses in which computer competency is assessed.
This change will reduce paperwork, and eliminate one case where we have to track down information from course sections administered from outside our department.