Developing Assessment Rubrics in Project Based Courses: Four Case Studies

A common approach to assessing outcomes in project based courses is to use formal scoring guides or rubrics. However, there are major challenges in using such rubrics. These challenges are related to the variety of outcomes of project based courses and the desire to use rubrics for both formative and summative assessment. In addition, there are difficulties related to building a common understanding of the rubric criteria among both students and instructors. As part of a visiting researcher appointment at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg Sweden the author worked closely with several course leaders (examiners) to create rubrics in baccalaureate and masters level project based courses. Rubrics developed as part of the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) Valid Assessment of Learning in Undergraduate Education (VALUE) project were adapted to address the criteria related to specific course learning outcomes. These collaborations resulted in the case studies that are described in this paper.

Proceedings of the 9th International CDIO Conference, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Cambridge, Massachusetts, June 9 – 13, 2013.