Beyond Letter Grades: A Case Study in Developing an Evaluation System to Generate Project Performance Transcripts

Abstract

Traditional academic transcripts are usually restricted to demonstrating stu-dents’ achievements and experiences during college life. As an example of extended transcripts, this study aims to introduce the development process behind an end-user product for a project performance evaluation system (PPES), which supports conducting project performance evaluations and generates project performance transcripts at a university. The first part of the study described the design process of the PPES. A user group of instructors, which continuously provided feedback on the prototype design, was formed. Consequently, the PPES was successfully developed and several main inter-faces of the PPES were presented. The second part of the study analyzed user satisfaction with the PPES and the project performance transcripts it pro-duced. In general, students perceived the project performance transcripts positively, and instructors were satisfied with both the PPES and its tran-scripts. The implications of developing a project performance evaluation sys-tem were discussed.