Rethinking Course Evaluations in Light of the Learning Paradigm

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Rethinking Course Evaluationsin Light of the
Learning Paradigm

• AASCU Academic Affairs Summer Meeting
• Creating the Learning-Centered Institution
• Boston, Massachusetts
• July 24-27, 2008

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Background and Overview

• Faculty Committee on form and process
• AAHE/Carnegie Foundation Peer Review of Teaching
  Pilot Project
• University Committee on evaluation redesign
• Faculty development in learning, assessment, and
  portfolio development
• Current work as a Vice President for Academic
  Affairs

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Why Course Evaluations Matter

• Provide evidence of teaching or learning culture
• Offer programmatic and institutional perspectives

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Evaluating Teaching

• Focus is on student perception/rating of
  instructor
• Emphasis on lecture and delivery

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• Results used to improve or judge teacher
• Results considered private, even potentially
  embarrassing
• Students and other community members never see
  any effect of completing evaluations

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• Student as inspector
• Faculty as specimen

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• Through this procedure we are implicitly
  teaching students to deflect responsibility.
• Rouben Cholakian, 1994

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Evaluating Learning

• Focus is on student perception of learning
• Instructors and students roles in learning can
  be clearer

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• Questions can ask about student activities more
  than instructor performance
• Results are used by individuals, groups, and
  institution to improve student learning

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Kent State Faculty Inquiry
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• What have we learned from seven years of using
  the current evaluation form and process?
• Could some questions be eliminated?
• Should every course be evaluated?
• How can the form reflect learning and
  responsibility for learning?
• Should the form encourage more writing?
• Should the information provided be made public?

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Student Survey

• 200 undergraduate students from different courses
• Interpretations of the 20 items on the SEI
• Results that challenge views of statistical
  significance

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Committee Observations

• Values of engaging students and faculty in
  reflections on courses
• Need for more formative uses of evaluation
• Need for greater context for students and faculty

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• Concerns about interpretations of data
• Concerns about reliance on mean scores
• Need to engage the Faculty Senate in this
  conversation

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Kent State Redesign Project

• Senate-appointed committee
• Examination of issues and form
• Revision and testing of a new form

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Lessons from the Kent State Projects

• Need for shifting away from perceived measure of
  instructor performance

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• Need for further measures of deep learning
  activities and results

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• Need for peer perspectives on teaching
  (collegial development of teaching)

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• Need for conversations about aggregated results
  to promote institutional change

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Project at SUNY Fredonia

• Committee revising form and drafting policies
• Another committee studying online options
• Discussions in Senate and in departments
• Workshops on peer review, chairs role in faculty
  reviews

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Challenges for Chief Academic Officers

• Sense that evaluations are scorecards
• Reliance on evaluation data in reviewing faculty
• View of evaluations as private
• Unfamiliar habits within departments of looking
  at aggregated data

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• Virginia Schaefer Horvath
• Vice President for Academic Affairs
• State University of New York at Fredonia
• horvath_at_fredonia.edu