Program Educational Objectives Definition and Assessment for Accreditation Purposes

Abstract

Academic accreditation of degree programs is becoming an important mean for many institutions to improve the quality of their degree programs. Many programs, in particular computing and engineering, offered by many schools have engaged in the accreditation process with different accreditation bodies. The most known accreditation body in the Unites States of America for engineering, computing, technology, and applied science programs is ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology). A key problem towards the satisfaction of ABET accreditation criteria is the appropriate definition and assessment of program educational objectives for a specific degree program.  Program Educational Objectives are important as they represent the ultimate mean to judge the quality of a program. They related directly to student outcomes and curriculum of a degree program. We propose a set of guidelines to help understand how program educational objectives can be defined and assessed. We relate and use examples from our practical experience acquired while working on the ABET accreditation of a Software Engineering progra