Student Achievement Assessment Committee

Marketing Specialization Learning Outcomes:

1. Marketing students will communicate a working knowledge of the basic marketing framework. In particular, marketing students will demonstrate an understanding of:
a. Customer analysis . . . .
b. Information acquisition, management, and use . . . .
c. Marketing mix design and marketing strategy development . . . .
. . . . for purposes of creating customer value leading to a sustainable competitive advantage.

2. Marketing students should be able to demonstrate the ability to:
a. Work effectively as a member of a larger team.
b. Communicate clearly and concisely in both written and oral form.
c. Develop and evaluate creative solutions, while solving problems.

Assessment Activities in AY 2004-05

In-Basket Student Competition

Purpose: to obtain data for analyzing marketing specialization seniors’ abilities to integrate and apply knowledge about customer analysis, information acquisition, and marketing strategy development; also, oral communication skills and ability to work effectively in teams.

Rationale: past assessments revealed the need to assess seniors on their conceptual integration and application skills. Also, we have recently assessed formal oral presentation skills, but had yet to assess informal communication skills and team work skills.

Method Description: students in MKT 460 (senior capstone course) formed two competition teams. Because this was the first competition, students were asked to volunteer to participate. Teams met on a Saturday in April 2005 to work. Each team was given the same Harvard Business School case and tasked with coming up with recommendations to be communicated to the team’s hypothetical supervising manager. They were to outline for the manager the criteria to be used and information needed to choose among alternatives suggested by the case. The case exercise required students to apply and integrate their knowledge about customer analysis, information acquisition, and marketing strategy development (our learning outcomes).
Each team was videotaped in our CBA Communications Lab as they discussed the case and developed their recommendations. Videotapes were copied and delivered to three judges: a Marketing faculty member and two Marketing Advisory Council (professional business advisors) members. Each analyzed and rank ordered each team’s performance. A monetary prize was given to the team ranked highest overall.

Results: the competition took place at the end of Spring 2005 so we have yet to fully analyze the videotapes. Future plans include analyzing the tapes for oral communication skills and ability to work effectively with a team. We will also look carefully at students’ abilities with respect to our marketing related learning outcomes above. When these evaluations are done we can complete the assessment cycle and identify needed curriculum enhancements. Also, the next time we hold the competition, we plan to require participation of all MKT 460 students.

Future Assessment at the BSBA level: the competition is a model for a similar exercise at the BSBA level, involving seniors across BSBA specializations.


Other Related Activities

The following activities are not true assessment activities as they serve other purposes. However, they broaden our opportunities to detect assessment needs or to conduct future assessment programs.

Marketing Advance Program. Students are selected for this department program based on GPA, faculty recommendations, and student applications. Students are paired with members of our Marketing Advisory Council (professional advisor team) who mentor the students on professional and career related matters. The mentors are experienced practitioners holding higher level positions in their companies and are involved in hiring and training college graduates. The Advance students provide us a group of engaged and interested students from which to obtain feedback about our specialization. The program is new, but as more Advance students graduate, they will form a data base of alumni to survey about how their classroom and extra-curricular experiences prepared them for their careers.

Marketing Senior Survey. Each year the Department conducts a brief survey with marketing specialization seniors. The survey measures satisfaction with courses and perceptions of the extent to which they have developed substantive knowledge and communication, team work, and problem solving skills. The survey also invites open ended responses about students’ experiences.
This feedback has led to continuous improvement in department support activities (e.g., registration support) and communications. The survey would also help us identify major problem areas we may have, as perceived by the students viewpoints. So far, we have not detected any major problems, but will continue to administer this survey in the event that it might reveal program development needs.