Assessment Is Constructed and Contextual: A Faculty-Librarian Pilot to Explore Critical Approaches to Curriculum & Assessment

Abstract

Students of color and marginalized-identifying students have more sophisticated critical information literacy skills across all dimensions compared to the comparison groups, reflecting greater cumulative awareness of: Journalistic/editorial best practices, Author expertise, Type of work (genre), Source research/evidence, Methods, Local sourcing, Diverse voices. Looking at specific dimensions of information literacy, Students of color and students who approach the research task as an opportunity to defend their own culture more frequently described the importance of including local voices in news reporting, compared to the comparison groups. Students of color and marginalized-identifying students more frequently critically evaluated the research/evidence of their sources than the comparison groups. Maginalized-identifying students more frequently considered authors' expertise when evaluating sources than mainstream-identifying students. Key Findings: 1. Students who self-identify as marginalized are better at critically assessing information than students who do not. Many approaches to assessment of student learning, even those that seek to operationalize critical approaches and an equity framework, persist in centering the deficiencies of marginalized students as a starting point, seeking to bring these learners “up” to what is perceived as “normative.” This finding reveals that marginalized students can also be the standard-bearers. 2. Interviews can be sites of meaning-making. Alternative assessment methods (in this case, interviews and grounded-theory methodologies) provide opportunities for educators and students to mutually engage in revealing assets of learners and meaning making that can help us (students and instructors) extend beyond/breakthrough academic conditioning. 3. Interviews offer opportunities for asset-based, anti-racist assessment. Alternative assessment methodologies may have particularly powerful implications for the development of learning outcomes that center the assets of students who are under-represented in the academy. The theme of “defending own culture” can be extrapolated to information literacy skills such as: Recognizing bias, Invoking one’s power as a producer of information, Countering stereotypical narratives.