Elaine Finan

Elaine Finan
  • Assistant Director
  • Student Learning, Outcomes Assessment, and Accreditation
  • Phone: 401.874.9503
  • Fax: 401.874.4133
  • Email: efinan@uri.edu
  • Office Location: Tyler Hall

Biography

Elaine Finan has been part of the Assessment Office since 2007. Elaine guides institutional and departmental efforts to assess student learning. She works with faculty in undergraduate, graduate and general education programs to ensure the development of assessment processes that are integrated into the curriculum. She also promotes assessment activities to internal and external audiences and works to ensure that our assessment practices are in compliance with campus policies as well as state and regional accreditation demands.

Elaine has extensive experience with national assessment instruments (Wabash, NSSE, CAAP), as well as in designing assessment instruments and evaluative tools. She has been key personnel on several successful grants focused on student learning including USDA, Davis Educational Foundation, and NSF. She has published and presented on a range of assessment initiatives at ACRL, AEA, and NERCOMP, and her interests include the promotion of assessment through the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning projects.

Primary Responsibilities 

  • Leads the development of institutional assessment processes and practices that are integrated into the curriculum, aligned with the University’s strategic initiatives, informed by local and national trends, and in compliance with campus policies and accreditation demands.
  • Engages faculty to promote student success, learning opportunities for faculty and students, and continuous program improvement through program-level learning outcomes assessment, curricular innovation, reflection and action for all academic programs, certificates and general education.
  • Provides faculty partnership and support through individual and group consultation and programming, measuring success by results that show enhanced value and utility of assessment efforts.
  • Collaborates with faculty, programs, departments, colleges and other stakeholders to support varied assessment and evaluation activities for internal and external audiences including academic programs, grant projects, accreditors, national assessments.
  • Oversees internal and external assessment accreditation reporting

Research

Project and Research Experience (local, regional, national)

  • New England Consortium for Higher Education: Co-Chair, Interim Report, Standard Eight Reflective Essay (Fall 2022); Co-Chair, Self-study, Standard Eight (2017)
  • National Survey of Student Engagement (2011, 2013, 2016, 2019) 
  • URI Triennial Assessment Climate Survey (2009, 2012, 2015, 2018, 2021, 2024 tbd)

Education

  • M.A., Education (focus:  Higher Education Administration),  University of Rhode Island
  • B.S., Biology, Providence College

Selected Publications

  • DiCiciccio, R., Finan, E., Reed, D. (2024, 4/12). Capitalizing On Existing Strategies. AAC&U General Education, Pedagogy, and Assessment Conference. Presentation accepted.
  • Druschke CG, Karraker N, McWilliams SR, Scott A, Morton-Aiken J, Reynolds N, Finan E, Lofgren IE. 2021. A low‐investment, high‐impact approach for training stronger and more confident graduate student science writers. Conservation Science and Practice. 2022;4:e573.
  • Grady, S., Morton-Aiken, J., Gottschalk Druscke, C., Lofgren, IE., Karraker, N., McWilliams, S., Reynolds, N., Finan, E., Leff, D., Kennedy, M., Defining a Flexible Notion of “Good” STEM Writing Across Contexts: Lessons Learned from a Cross-Institutional Conversation
  • Frontiers in Communication: Science and Environmental Communication. 2022;vol.7
  • Topper, A., Finan E., Meta-Assessment of Program Assessment Compliance, Performance, and Internalization” New England Association of Schools and Colleges Annual meeting (2019). Poster session.
  • Diciccio R., Finan E., Kaldor E., Shifting Campus Conversations to Advance New General Education Programs. Peer Review, AACU (2018) January; 20(3)