Raising the Stakes on a Political Science Major Field Test: Evidence From a New Capstone Course

Abstract

Using a major field test (MFT) is a common method of program assessment. For accurate assessment to take place, however, students must be sufficiently motivated to perform. This paper studies a change in major requirements that associated a major field test to a grade in a political science capstone course. After controlling for possible confounders like Gender, Age, Ethnicity, and differences in GPA and ACT scores, a modest but statistically significant treatment effect was found. However, the fit between a student’s program GPA and MFT scores did not improve, leading to questions about how best to assess political science knowledge for program graduates.