Assessment of the Undergraduate Economics Major: A National Survey

Economics departments are faced with growing demands to document what their graduates have learned on completion of the undergraduate major. The results of a national survey of economics department chairs in the United States reveal that nearly two-thirds of the departments have a formal assessment plan. There is substantial agreement on the most important student-learning outcomes, which are consistent with the Hansen proficiencies. The most common approaches that departments employ to measure learning outcomes are course-embedded assessments and senior exit surveys. Capstone courses and senior projects as program assessment methods are most common in departments that are not in business schools and are without doctoral programs. Finally, more than half of the departments have adjusted their curriculum based on the results of their own assessment plans.