Illinois has joined a much-debated national trend of overseeing how juniors and seniors are learning at public colleges and universities like NIU.

As the state Board of Higher Education tightens its standards and pushes for schools to find ways to assess students’ knowledge by 2004, NIU President John Peters says the effort is not new.

“I have been involved with this issue for many years now, and the board wants to know what schools are making the best progress and evaluate their education and curriculum standards,” Peters said.

“Each of the states’ higher education boards feel that schools are not on the right page in developing tools for evaluating upperclassmen progress. Despite this, I am sure that if you are anything from a political science major to a chemistry major or anything else, you are going to master that major by the time you graduate. We do our job well.”

The IBHE won’t use a standardized test or another system that compares one institution to another. Rather, it will test students and use the results to help schools improve their academic standards. Peters said the recent push to review colleges across the country stems from all of the failures or “incompletes” that public schools give their students on the annual national education report card.

The board wants to test Illinois junior and seniors in their particular fields of study but also in what they refer to as “core curriculum,” otherwise known as general education courses, Peters said.

Currently, NIU has no set standard for evaluating students on any level besides post-graduation. The SAT and ACT tests taken by incoming freshmen are the only tests used to evaluate general knowledge.

“I have asked the faculty to investigate the role of the ACT and SAT during the admissions process, and the base curriculum is currently being worked on,” Peters said. “My view is that I will ask the new provost for his ideas and input, and also the faculty, because they are the ones who are teaching the material and whose opinions matter most with this.”

Incoming provost J. Ivan Legg has had unsuccessful experience with state evaluations at his current school, the University of Memphis.

“We had problems here where we made some curriculum changes that backfired, and it did more harm than good,” Legg said. “This does not mean some things cannot be done at NIU, though, and that needs to be discussed with the president and especially the faculty.”

Legg said the trick to measuring schools’ accountability is to identify exactly what knowledge will be measured — and some schools set standards too broadly.

“With time, the graduates show the success of the school, and that is the best assessment,” Legg said. “Whether we stay with the status quo or adjust some of our methods, it must be agreed on by all and be in the best interest of the students.”