Louisiana State University College Portrait

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Students
Find out more about the characteristics of students who attend LSU.
Admissions
See how many students applied, accepted, and enrolled at LSU. Learn more about students’ high school preparation and test scores.
College Costs & Financial Aid
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College Cost Estimator
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Classes and Campus Life
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Student Experiences
Discover ways to be actively involved in your education at LSU – inside and outside the classroom.
Majors, Graduation and Next Steps
See which majors are most popular at LSU and what recent graduates plan to do after earning their bachelor's degree.
Student Success & Progress
Discover how many students who start at LSU finish their bachelor's degree and how long it takes.
Student Learning Outcomes
Figure out what learning gains to expect in critical thinking, writing, and other important subjects at LSU.

Student Learning at Louisiana State University

All colleges and universities use multiple approaches to measure student learning. Many of these are specific to particular disciplines, many are coordinated with accrediting agencies, and many are based on outcomes after students have graduated.

Louisiana State University's commitment to student learning is reinforced by the use of a variety of assessment strategies, including the National Survey of Student Engagement, the Collegiate Learning Assessment, the California Critical Thinking Dispositions Inventory, and numerous locally developed assessment methodologies. In recent years assessment practitioners have conducted focus groups for institutional programs such as residential colleges, service learning, Communication across the Curriculum, University Writing, and for such academic departments as English, Accounting, Interior Design, and Plant and Soil Systems. The basic repository of campus assessment is the LSU Academic Programs Assessment Matrix. Members of the faculty comprise the University Assessment Council, which is responsible for student needs and learning outcomes assessment at the University.

Learning Assessment Examples

Pilot Project to Measure Core Learning Outcomes

Colleges and universities participating in the College Portrait measure the typical improvement in students' abilities to think, reason, and write using one of three tests. This is part of a pilot project to better understand and compare what students learn between their freshman and senior years at different colleges and universities.

- Results from the Collegiate Learning Assessment

The Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA) measures critical thinking, analytic reasoning, problem solving, and written communication using a performance task and an analytic writing task. The scores from the tasks are reported separately below.

Test Administration Process

Test Information

Performance Task Results for First-time, Full-time Students

The increase in learning on the performance task is below what would be expected at an institution testing students of similar academic abilities.

Freshman Score: 1145
Senior Score: 1205
CLA score range: 400 to no maximum score.

Average ACT scores for tested students
Freshman Score: 26
Senior Score: 27

Average EEA scores for tested students
Freshman Score: 1181
Senior Score: 1213

Analytic Writing Task Results for First-time, Full-time Students

The increase in learning on the analytic writing task is well above what would be expected at an institution testing students of similar academic abilities.

Freshman Score: 1022
Senior Score: 1269
CLA score range: 400 to no maximum score.