Isn't the education of a student more than the sum total of classes that a student has taken? What about all the other experiences that students have? Are majors and departments the only units involved in assessment efforts?

Excellent question! In fact, this is exactly what the Council on Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA), the consortium of the regional accrediting association, has identified as a critical factor in accreditations. We know that students learn many things outside of class. We know that so much of education is influenced by the resources that are available. So CHEA has been exploring the relationship of student support services, faculty support services, and resource allocations to student learning. They'd like to know, for example, the role of the library in student learning, the availability and quality of technology in supporting student learning, the quality of faculty development efforts, and the priority for classroom learning in the institution's strategic and budget planning, among other factors. For them, student learning is central to the mission of any higher education institution and cannot be the responsibility of the faculty alone.