Background
The IUPUI electronic institutional portfolio, much like individual faculty or student electronic portfolios, is a Web site for self-evaluation, reflection, and planning. Originally developed as part of a national initiative that experimented with the use of electronic media to inform university stakeholders about campus work and effectiveness, it is ultimately intended to reach a number of key IUPUI audiences. The narrative materials currently included in the portfolio were developed specifically for NCA accreditation purposes; eventually, these narratives will become just one of several possible pathways through the portfolio Web site.
In developing the portfolio, we have focused on using the features of the Web-menus, navigational tools, and drill-downs-to allow users of the site to make efficient connections between arguments and supporting evidence and between general statements and more detailed information. The multi-media capabilities of the electronic environment have enabled us to capture authentic samples of student and faculty work, accomplishments, and performances in audio, video, and graphical, as well as written form. We encourage you to explore these links; we believe they provide a more comprehensive, evidence-rich portrait of the campus than can be captured in linear written narrative alone.
Organization
The portfolio is organized around seven main sections:
Three of the sections-teaching and learning; research, scholarship, and creative activity; and civic engagement-correspond to the main components of IUPUI"s mission. "About the Portfolio" includes this guide, along with historical background on the development of the portfolio and links to similar efforts by other universities. "About IUPUI" provides important factual information about the campus, its facilities, and its students. The "Performance Indicators" section displays information on evaluation of the campus"s performance in relation to its mission, based on evidence, and includes drill-down capabilities that allow portfolio users to access detailed information, relevant reports and other documents, and, where applicable, information on improvement efforts. The "Accreditation Self-Study" portion of the portfolio is your entry point to the main self-study narrative materials and links.
Each main section includes sub-sections and content pages. A variety of navigational aids and usability design best practices were developed to make the portfolio as user-friendly as possible. Some of these features are:
- Universal navigation present on all pages
- Sub-section navigation present on section pages and relevant content pages
- Breadcrumb text navigation present on all pages
- Text navigation present on the footers of all pages
The portfolio also includes additional user resources to help with searching for and retrieving information. These resources can be accessed from any section or sub-section page and include:
- A site-wide search engine
- A glossary of common IUPUI acronyms
- Important IUPUI Web site links
"Reading" the IUPUI Portfolio
Because the narrative materials developed for the NCA self-study are fairly extensive, we suggest that you read them in paper form first to get a sense of the major themes and arguments of the self-study. Then visit the Web site and explore the linked information, using the links embedded in the narrative or in the menus and navigational aids on the site to access the information you want to see.
Because Web-based self-studies are a relatively new phenomenon, there are no hard-and-fast rules for how much of the linked materials you should review. These materials are comparable to what might be found in the appendices or the resource room in a paper-based self-study. We suggest that you read as much as you need to satisfy yourself that you have sufficient information on the topic under discussion to make a judgment about it. In some cases, this may mean simply clicking on a link and assuring yourself that documentation and evidence exist; in other cases, you may wish to read materials in detail. The material that can be accessed from the portfolio site-as with any other complex Web site-is voluminous. We do not expect that all team members will have thoroughly read all linked reports, policies, analyses, and so on.
We do wish to encourage you to visit the "Examples" pages, which use multiple media to show the work that our students, faculty, and staff actually do, and the "Initiatives" pages, which provide overviews and examples of our ongoing efforts to assess and improve our effectiveness. We hope that as you review the portfolio/self-study, you will consider the usefulness of presenting material in this way and strategies that might make the Web site more helpful in the future. Some of the questions we ask our NCA review team members to focus on concern the electronic presentation of material and its potential for improving future accreditation review processes.
Questions about the IUPUI Portfolio may be directed to Dr. Susan Kahn, Director, Office of Institutional Effectiveness at (317) 278-3604 or skahn@iupui.edu.
