Signature Assignments are a well researched high impact educational practice, commonly used in general education programs. In general, signature assignments are culminating tasks in a course that:

• Assess key learning outcomes
• Demonstrate students’ cumulative learning (within the course)
• Engage students in meaningful, authentic demonstrations of learning
• Integrate multiple skills or knowledge areas
• Incorporate a reflection assignment that guides students in making meaning of their own learning

Key Features of a Signature Assignment

1. Authenticity. Signature assignments engage students in authentic demonstrations of learning, resulting in meaningful student artifacts. An assignment can be authentic in several ways:
   • Authentic to the discipline. The assignment may be representative of the sort of thing you and others in your discipline actually do.
   • Authentic to a profession. The assignment may be representative of the sort of thing professionals in some relevant profession actually do.
   • Authentic to society. The assignment may be representative of the sort of thing active, engaged members of society actually do (or that they should do).

1. Assessment of Key Outcomes. Signature assignments are used to assess key outcomes in the course, including (most notably) the core competencies the course is designed to develop.
2. Reflection Assignment. Signature assignments incorporate a separate, but connected, reflection assignment that prompts and guides students in making meaning of their learning, as represented in the signature assignment and, potentially, other artifacts in the class.

Designing a Signature Assignment

Signature assignments can come in many forms. To begin the process of identifying and designing a signature assignment, consider the following two questions:

1. What is an authentic task that students should be better able to complete as a result of the course?
2. What are the core competency learning outcomes I need to assess?

You can ask these two questions in either order, each providing a different process for constructing the signature assignment.

Authenticity First

You may choose to focus on crafting a short list of possible authentic tasks, setting aside the core competencies. If you take this approach, you would want to consider the following sorts of questions:

• What tasks do I and those in my disciplinary field engage in that I believe students should be (better) able to do upon successful completion of the course?
• What tasks do professionals in some relevant field engage in that I believe students should be (better) able to do upon successful completion of the course?
• What tasks do engaged members of society engage in that I believe students should be (better) able to do upon successful completion of the course?
• What sort of task fits with the course and requires synthesizing skills and knowledge from throughout the course?
• What sort of task best represents the most important level of learning in the course and/or the most important thing students should be able to do upon completion of the course?

Once you’ve drawn up a list of possible tasks, then you can think about which task(s) would function well to assess the core competency learning outcomes.

Core Competencies First

An alternative design approach starts with the core competency learning outcomes and engages in “backward design” toward an authentic assessment of the skills captured in those learning outcomes. This approach works especially well if you are designing a course from scratch rather than attempting to revise an existing assignment/course. Using this approach, you would:

1. List out each possible learning outcome for the require core competencies.
2. For each, ask how disciplinary experts, professionals, or engaged members of society may use the skill specified in the outcome.
3. Review your list to narrow in on your learning outcomes by asking the following sorts of questions:
   • Are there learning outcomes, associated with each core competency, that seem to speak to a similar type of task?
   • For which learning outcomes have you specified especially interesting/detailed/important tasks?
   • Are there any learning outcomes for which you identified tasks that are especially central to the course or of particular interest to you?
4. Using the information gathered in the previous step, identify the 2 learning outcomes you will focus on for each core competency
5. Construct the authentic task that fits with the core competency learning outcomes. At this stage, you may realize you need more than one signature assignment or you may be able to assess all outcomes in a single assignment.

Crafting the Signature Assignment Overview

Once you have a genuine authentic assessment for students to engage in, the next step is presenting it to them in such a way as to emphasize its meaningfulness. Additionally, it is important to be clear about the task and the criteria for success. One well researched way to do this is to make use of the “Transparency in Learning & Teaching” (TILT) framework for transparency in assignment design. That framework emphasizes designing instruction/overview documents explicitly identifying 3 elements:

1. The purpose of the assignment. Here you can emphasize how the task in authentic and also what skills/knowledge students should expect to apply and develop in completing the assignment.
2. The task. Here you should provide a clear process for completing the task. If certain things must be done before other things, provide an ordered list. You may also emphasize specific things to avoid.
3. The criteria for success. Providing students, in advance, with a clear rubric or other indication of how the assignment will be evaluated reduces their anxiety in completing the task and provides an opportunity for them to self-assess.
   • Note: For the purposes of the core curriculum, this criteria for success should very explicitly incorporate assessment of the designated core competency learning outcomes.

You may also want to include an “appendix” of resources, such as examples, on later pages or in separate documents.

Signature Assignment Overview Template – You may download and use this template, which is derived from the TILT framework template.

Incorporating Meaningful Reflection

See Designing for Reflection