Dr. Steven Weisler is dean of academic development and professor of linguistics at Hampshire College, an innovative liberal arts college and member of the Five College consortium in Amherst, Massachusetts. As dean, Steve is responsible for assessment and evaluation, and contributes to the development of new academic programs at Hampshire. He currently leads two Teagle-funded assessment initiatives involving consortia that are exploring value-added assessment and the relationship between liberal education and a life of work. Steve has published and presented papers on qualitative assessment, assessment of the first-year experience and the evaluation of integrative learning. He is currently developing an approach for assessing the capstone experience and is pursuing a study of grading as a useful component in assessment. His interests in linguistics and cognitive science include syntactic theory, formal semantics, and the study of learning.