Defining and measuring academic standards for higher education: A formative study at the University of Sonora
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PublisherThe University of Arizona.
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AbstractInstitutional efforts to organize the admissions process in several Mexican universities have led to the adoption of standardized instruments to measure applicants' initial academic qualifications for career programs. The University of Sonora, located in four campuses throughout the state, initiated the administration of a college level entrance exam in the fall of 1997. The Examen de Conocimientos y Habilidades Basicas (EXCHOBA), developed in 1991, is the instrument employed for aiding the academic and administrative agencies in making admissions and career placement decisions to date. Drawing on current practice, this project develops a model for investigating the alignment of the high school curriculum with the entrance examination by extracting and clarifying the academic standards that derive from the official curriculum. Through a series of statistical analyses on data from exam administrations, a working model for defining the standards along with the instruments' sub-tests is proposed. The basis for a system are then suggested to assist high school and university agencies and administrators to interpret the results with a clear set of procedures for making curricular and instructional decisions that will help improve the current rates of success in the different career programs at the institution. In particular, the results obtained will lead to a proposal to improve the academic advising and guidance programs that the Universidad de Sonora is currently implementing to improve student retention and graduation rates in its career programs.
Degree ProgramGraduate College