This question has two parts; be sure to answer both. First, explain the three steps in the OD process. Next, suppose you are a student member of your college's or university's committee that is attempting to study why an excessive number of students drop out of your college. Give examples of activities your task force might take in each stage of its OD process.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

The three steps in the OD process are diagnosis (identifying the problem), intervention (the attempt to correct the diagnosed problems), and evaluation (assessing how well the intervention worked). In a feedback loop, those in charge of the OD process further refine their diagnosis and intervention(s).

In terms of the task force, examples of diagnostic actions might be generating a survey of students or interviewing students who dropped out. Examples of interventions might be changes to the advising process or changing the first-year student orientation to explain the support system for struggling students. Examples of evaluation would be comparing dropout rates before and after the intervention.