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How Can You Make Assignments Transparent?

The introductory video to this collection highlights the purposes behind developing transparent assignments, including increases to educational equity. The remaining resources help you get started and offer you concrete ways to continue to improve the transparency of your assignments.

Course and Assignment Design
Updated March 2025
Michael Palmer headshot
Michael Palmer
Barbara Fried Director & Professor
Office of the Executive Vice President and Provost
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01

Using a Transparent Framework to Remove Barriers to College Students’ Success

TILT Higher Ed

This short video, based on research from the TILT Higher Education project, explains how transparent assignment design improves educational equity, student learning, and other student success outcomes.

Headshot of Michael Palmer
Michael Palmer

This short video, based on research from the TILT Higher Education project, explains how transparent assignment design improves educational equity, student learning, and other student success outcomes.

Video
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02

Transparent Assignment Template

TILT Higher Ed

This template can be used as a guide for developing, explaining, and discussing class activities and out-of-class assignments.

Headshot of Michael Palmer
Michael Palmer

This template can be used as a guide for developing, explaining, and discussing class activities and out-of-class assignments.

File
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03

Checklist for Designing a Transparent Assignment

TILT Higher Ed

This handy checklist will help you think through various ways to make your assignment’s purpose, task, and criteria more transparent.

Headshot of Michael Palmer
Michael Palmer

This handy checklist will help you think through various ways to make your assignment’s purpose, task, and criteria more transparent.

File
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04

Measuring Transparency: A Learning-Focused Assignment Rubric

To Improve the Academy

By combining recommendations for effective assignment design with principles of transparency and the value-expectancy theory of achievement motivation, this rubric will help you assess the quality and guide the design of your assignments. The rubric defines criteria characteristic of well-designed assignments; breaks the criteria down into concrete, measurable components; and suggests what evidence for each component might look like.

Headshot of Michael Palmer
Michael Palmer

By combining recommendations for effective assignment design with principles of transparency and the value-expectancy theory of achievement motivation, this rubric will help you assess the quality and guide the design of your assignments. The rubric defines criteria characteristic of well-designed assignments; breaks the criteria down into concrete, measurable components; and suggests what evidence for each component might look like.

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By combining recommendations for effective assignment design with principles of transparency and the value-expectancy theory of achievement motivation, we developed a rubric capable of for assessing the quality and guiding the design of assignment descriptions. This rubric defines criteria characteristic of well-designed assignments; breaks the criteria down into concrete, measurable components; and suggests what evidence for each component might look like. While the full rubric is valid for major, signature assignments, it can accommodate a diverse range. It can also provide summative, quantitative information to educational developers for research and formative, qualitative feedback to instructors for gauging the quality of their assignments.

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