Texas A&M University Office of Institutional Effectiveness and Evaluation

The Academic Program Assessment Guidelines is a comprehensive manual that guides Program Coordinators step-by-step through the documentation process. We recommend reviewing the manual before developing your program's Assessment Plan as it describes key components of learning outcomes assessment.

The manual includes:

  • An introduction to program assessment at Texas A&M University
  • How to use HelioCampus to document your Assessment Plan & Report
  • Detailed information about each section of the Plan & Report, including the criteria Liaisons use to provide feedback
  • FAQs for each section of the Plan & Report
  • The holistic rubric used by OIEE to assign Compliance Indicators at the end of the documentation cycle (also found at the bottom of this page)

Recent Updates to the Guidelines Manual

  • February 2026: Added information about key differences in the appearance of 25-26 and 26-27 assessment forms; namely, minor workflow step name changes and updated options that will appear under the Use of Results section in 26-27 forms.
  • May 2025: Clarified information about direct and indirect measures under Measures & Targets. Added information about specificity of finding statements and a related FAQ under Findings. Reordered FAQs in some sections.

Guidelines Manual

Minimum Requirements for Plans & Reports

More information and examples can be found in the Academic Program Assessment Guidelines.

Assessment Plans

  1. At least one Program Learning Outcome (PLO) must be included in the submitted Plan. 
    • Each program should have identified at least 3 PLOs overall, which may be assessed on rotation.
    • Best practice is assessing all outcomes within a 5 year period.
  2. Each PLO must be accompanied by at least one DIRECT measure.
  3. Targets must include specific thresholds that directly align with the related measure and PLO.

Assessment Reports

  1. Findings must be disaggregated if the report includes:
    • 2 or more credentials (e.g., MS/PhD)
    • A program offered via different modes of delivery (e.g., FTF option and Online option)
  2. Regularly low-enrolled programs must aggregate their data across cycles in order to report findings annually.
    • Undergraduate: Min. of 10 students for reporting
    • Graduate: Min. of 5 students for reporting
  3. The Use of Results section must describe an action designed to improve student learning--NOT an improvement to the assessment strategy.
  4. The Status Update section must refer to an action that was submitted in a Report from a previous assessment cycle.

Compliance Indicators


At the end of each Program Assessment cycle, OIEE staff review all Assessment Reports, provide final comments, and assign a Compliance Indicator. Compliance Indicators are simply meant to inform Program Coordinators and Liaisons of how well documentation requirements were met and to identify which programs might benefit from additional support during the documentation process. The rubric below is used to assign a Compliance Indicator to each report. 

Compliance Indicator descriptions
Compliance Indicator Description of Criteria
Exemplary
The report goes above and beyond minimum requirements (see above). This generally includes the following:
  • There is more than one measure for each Program Learning Outcome (PLO). 
  • Thorough, detailed descriptions in each section—data collection methods, data analysis, scoring metrics, rubrics, etc.; the assessment process is clear and replicable. 
  • Findings are contextualized and appropriately disaggregated (if applicable).
  • Use of results is clear, detailed, and focused on student learning.
Sufficient
All minimum requirements are met:
  • PLOs have at least one direct measure and all measures are aligned with their respective PLO(s). 
  • The report is clear overall. Some areas could be strengthened by including more detail. 
  • Use of results is focused on student learning (i.e., a learning-centered curricular action). The planned execution may not be fully clear, but the intent is.
Needs Improvement
One or more of the following is true:
  • Assessment process is difficult to follow and may not be clearly replicable. 
  • Components of the report are misaligned (e.g., the measure does not align with the PLO). 
  • Findings are not disaggregated, if applicable (e.g., DE and FTF results, or MS and PhD results). 
  • Use of results may not be clearly focused on student learning (e.g., describes a change to the assessment plan and/or a plan for program leadership to meet), BUT the rest of the assessment plan/report is strong.
  • Program leadership and faculty involvement in assessment may not be clear.
Noncompliant Report was not submitted,  or one or more required components of the report is missing, such as a PLO, direct measure, and/or use of results. The report does not demonstrate the program's commitment to continuous improvement of student learning.

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