Teaching Evaluation

The Department of Biology is known nationally and within the university for excellence in teaching, and many of our faculty members have received teaching and mentoring awards as evidence of this reputation. Many of our instructors are well-trained in use of high structure active learning strategies. To be a fully student-centered department, we need to be able to measure our effectiveness in educating the next generation of scientists. Evaluating our individual faculty members is one part of this.

The Department of Biology uses a teaching evaluation process that incorporates three voices (students, peers, and instructor reflection). Faculty going up for a teaching evaluation for a summative evaluation (i.e. reappointment, promotion, and post-tenure review) put a teaching dossier together and the teaching evaluation committee (TEC) evaluates the submitted material, observes the faculty member teaching, and writes a report that is submitted to the department. As part of a grant-funded project by the Association of American Universities (AAU) that began in 2022, the Department of Biology seeks to improve not only the summative evaluation process but to build an annual formative process too. Below are the end goals of the AAU project.

Reappointment, Promotion, & Post-Tenure Reviews

Biology Faculty going up for a summative evaluation in Fall 2023 can assemble your teaching dossier by preparing these documents:

• A teaching statement. (See a new departmental teaching statement rubric that can provide guidance for your writing
• Most recent syllabi from all of the courses you have taught in the period since your last evaluation
• Most recent course evaluations from all of the courses you have taught in the period since your last evaluation
• A completed Educational Leadership Inventory
• A document showing the dates and times you are available to be observed by colleagues in the current or upcoming semester

The current Departmental Rubric for Peer Evaluation does not yet include evaluation of all listed above. The most current rubric being used to evaluate all faculty is linked here. This will change as the project progresses.

For faculty piloting the formative evaluation tools, please see more information about some of the tools below:

• The My Course Analytics Dashboard (MCAD) reflection tool to be used with investigation of one’s own student demographic and grade data using the My Course Analytics Dashboard website. Keep in mind that accessing your data requires a brief training before access is given.
• The DART Audio Reflection Tool. Use two different class recordings to analyze the percent of class time that is spent with a single voice (instructor or whole class discussion), multiple voices (students in small group discussions), or silence (students working independently
• Use a rubric to see if your course hits on some hallmarks of a high structure, inclusive course. Use the syllabus rubric.
• Observe a peer (or your own class recording) on what proportion of the class is active learning based on a time-based form called the Classroom Observation protocol for Undergraduate STEM (COPUS). After completing the observation, write a short reflective paragraph or two about using this as a tool and what you learned.
• Observe a peer (or your own class recording) executing an active learning activity with the adapted PORTAAL rubric that allows one to reflect on how an activity is set up, executed, and debriefed. After completing the observation, write a short reflective paragraph or two about using this as a tool and what you learned.
• Observe a peer (or your own class recording) with the departmental rubric that is used by the teaching evaluation committee. After completing the observation, write a short reflective paragraph or two about using this as a tool and what you learned.