Assessment Committee

The OUE Assessment Committee reconvened in AY20-21 with its largest membership to date. The group took part in planning the design of the OUE Assessment Town Hall in fall 2020 and participated in the events as judges and/or participants in the 3 Minute Assessment Thesis competition. The group has also played an important role in the transition from paper-based assessment reports to the new Assessment Management System, Watermark. The committee was introduced to the new system in a committee meeting where staff from the Office of Academic Effectiveness provided a demo and training on the new program.  All committee members have now entered their plans into Watermark for AY20-21 and will continue as the cycle progresses to work towards completion of this year’s reports. 

The group has also aimed to serve as a place for networking and professional development. As such, we have had several guest speakers this year including staff from the Office of Academic Effectiveness, who provided the previously described training and also later came to give an overview of Institutional surveys and reports; Enterprise Data Management, who in collaboration with OUE’s own BI Developer provided training and took feedback on LITE; and from Kennesaw State University’s student affairs assessment committee, who came for networking and discussion around assessment in student services. The Assessment Committee also took part in a peer review process, providing feedback on each report.

Communications & Marketing Working Group 

This year the group revamped its purpose/focus (“provide strategic planning and communications support to OUE’s units to ensure accurate and timely communication across the organization”). The group’s main focus over the past year was to develop a more robust social media strategy to reach students on campus. We have shared resources, best practices for content/posting, updated our OUE communications matrix (which shows all OUE social media accounts and email lists), and met with GTPD’s social media manager to see how they maintain a successful social media presence. Group discussions have led to the creation of a social media content calendar; the purchasing of Hootsuite for social media content posting, scheduling, and account analytics; expectations for interactions between department posts and OUE’s main accounts; and discussions around ways to leverage sites like Canva, Adobe Spark, and Linktree for better posts/profiles. 

The group has also been charged with shaping OUE’s role in FASET orientation and Week of Welcome. With the group’s input, we’ve come up with several ideas to help OUE gain more exposure with students & families in this year’s FASET sessions.

The group’s input has also led to:  

• the hiring of a web development contractor to assist with much-needed updates 
• input on the content for OUE’s newsletters 
• updating department print, marketing, and swag materials 
• updating event calendars for OUE, Parent/Family, and Student Life’s campus-wide Engagement calendar 

Professional Development Committee

The OUE Professional Development Committee began 2020-2021 in the summer with a new OUE Book Club that started by reading Brene Brown’s, Dare to Lead. The book club also completed Ibram X. Kendi’s How to be an Antiracist, Kristin Hannah’s The Great Alone, and The Art of Gathering by Pria Parker. The committee encouraged OUE staff to join Mentor TECH as a mentee or mentor this year and developed the OUE Professional Development Circles in the fall offering five circles in the areas of Leadership, Diversity and Inclusion, Career Development, Marketing and Communication, and Software.

Nearly twenty staff members participated in the Professional Development Circles, meeting weekly to watch LinkedIn Learning videos and discuss topics with a facilitator. The circles were well received by participants with 100% of survey respondents agreeing that they 1. learned something new, 2. can apply what they learned in their current role, and 3. were able to engage with OUE colleagues in a new way. With 91% of respondents “extremely likely” to participate again, the Professional Development Circles will be an annual staple of the committee’s offerings. The committee developed a process to collect OUE nominations for the Georgia Tech Staff Awards and nominated sixteen staff members for many awards. We, ultimately, had four GT Staff Award Winners.