Assessment of Learning Outcomes in Higher Education

Higher education institutions (HEIs) have experienced increasing pressures to provide accountabilitydata and consumer information on the quality of teaching and learning. But existing ratings and rankings ofHEIs tend to neglect information on student learning outcomes. Instead, they focus on inputs, activities andresearch outputs, such as resources used, classes taught, and articles published. Such indicators provide noindication of the degree to which HEIs actually develop the knowledge and skills of their students. In mostcountries, hardly any comparable information is available on the educational quality of differentprogrammes and institutions.In some countries, approaches to assess higher education learning outcomes have been developed, butlittle cross-country information is available on the characteristics of the instruments used. This paperprovides an overview of experience gained in this domain across OECD and partner countries. Based onillustrative evidence collected for 18 assessment instruments, it examines conceptual, organizational andmethodological aspects of existing assessments. It proposes a typology of higher education learningoutcomes and reviews the ways in which these have been assessed across countries. Examples are drawnfrom Australia, Brazil, Mexico, the United Kingdom and the United States.