evidence-based policy – Page 2

How Faculty Can Respond to Assessment Challenges

The SSRC’s Measuring College Learning (MCL) project has concluded its first phase in developing faculty-derived learning outcomes for a diverse set of undergraduate majors. In this essay, Richard Arum and Eleanor Blair discuss the intention and scope of the project, as well as detailing how they arrived at the result of their work, Improving Quality in American Higher Education. Faculty panels convened across six disciplines found, despite their diversity, that learning in majors should cohere principally around concepts and competencies, rather than content knowledge in and of itself.

Mining in Colombia: Searching for a Consensus

by Renata Segura

With the civil war in Colombia hopefully nearing a settlement, attention is turning to creating new economic opportunities, not least for demobilized combatants. The mining industry may play a key role here, and Renata Segura explains why through discussing the results of the SSRC’s Conflict Prevention and Peace Forum's (CPPF) recent work with the Working Group on Mining in Colombia (GDIAM). The working group report, Proposals for a Shared Vision on Mining in Colombia, is based on intense deliberations with all affected actors and emphasizes the opportunity to proactively shape the development of an inclusive, resilient, and competitive mining industry.

Strategic Action from Shared Understanding: the Experience of Sonoma County

by Alex Powers, Sarah Burd-Sharps and Kristen Lewis

Colleagues from the SSRC’s Measure of America program discuss how research on human well-being can shape policies to enhance it. Using the program’s in-depth research in Sonoma County, California, as a case study, the authors show how their findings of surprising disparities can effect change through local partnerships and strategies to communicate results in ways that resonate with a wide range of community members.