Teaching Quality Reports

Student feedback is valuable, but no single source can show the whole picture. Students can describe their experience of a course. However, students are not positioned to judge, for example, whether the course design fits the discipline, if course materials align with the learning outcomes, or whether the pedagogical approach was appropriate for the topic. Teaching evaluations in annual reviews and reappointment, promotion, and tenure processes should draw on multiple forms of evidence, and TQRs make it practically possible:

• For instructors: the report offers specific, constructive feedback from several perspectives, including questions to consider and suggestions to try, plus a place to describe important contextual variables and explain their own choices and plans.
• For supervisors: it brings together information that is otherwise scattered with one consistent report tied to the unit’s own teaching quality rubric.
• For colleges: it offers a shared, evidence-based approach to teaching evaluation that each college can adapt to their own values and disciplines.

Departments and colleges opt in. With support from Institutional Research in the Office of the Provost, participating units define the characteristics of high-quality teaching they care about, create a detailed rubric, and develop protocols for observations, reviews, and self-evaluation/reflection. Typically, each instructor goes through the process for one course-section per calendar year, and a report is produced each time. An instructor who teaches four different courses would have all four reviewed over four years. 
Reports can draw on multiple sources of evidence, such as:

1. Student feedback. Results from the SPLS, with selected questions aligned to the rubric.
2. Peer observation. A colleague offers feedback using a peer observation protocol that is aligned to the rubric.
3. Course artifact review. A reviewer examines materials such as the syllabus, assignments, assessments, and samples of student work and provides feedback using a course artifact review protocol that is aligned to the rubric.
4. Instructor self-evaluation/reflection. The instructor describes the evidence, context, and their reflections on the course using a self-evaluation/reflection protocol that is aligned to the rubric.

Click here to see a sample list of Characteristics of Quality Teaching.
Click here to see a sample of a Peer Observation Protocol.

For each characteristic, the report presents the ratings from each source side by side, followed by narrative comments. Ratings from peer observation, course artifact review, and self-evaluation use an evidence scale, which asks how much evidence there is that a characteristic of quality teaching is present. Peer and artifact comments typically describe what was reviewed, pose questions, and offer suggestions. The instructor's comments describe their evidence, context, and reflection. 

Sometimes a source can't speak to a characteristic. For example, one characteristic on the rubric simply might not be evident in the time that a peer observed a class. In these cases, the report marks the item "NRP" (no response provided) rather than forcing a rating.

Click here to see a sample of a Teaching Quality Report.

There is no overall score. The report deliberately does not average or combine ratings. Sources can differ, and the differences are informative. A student rating, a peer rating, and an instructor's self-rating may each reflect something different, and the narrative comments help explain why. 
Evidence is not evaluation. The report gathers evidence. People make the judgments. Chairs and other evaluators read the ratings and comments together, with attention to context. A lower rating may mean something different in a large lecture than in a small seminar, for example. Separating evidence from evaluation also lets peers and students give honest, constructive feedback. 
The tone is formative. Even when a report informs an evaluation, comments are written as observations, questions, and suggestions because the primary goal is to help instructors strengthen their teaching.

The instructor and the department chair receive each report. Departments that use TQRs generally treat them as formative feedback for instructors and as one input to annual review and reappointment. Some departments or colleges also draw on a collection of reports over time in promotion and tenure processes. Because reports for different courses accumulate across years, they can show a fuller picture of an instructor's teaching than any single term.

MSU Teaching Quality Reports are based on the framework advanced by Austin, Finkelstein, Follmer Greenhoot, Ward, & Cornejo Weaver in their book Transforming College Teaching Evaluation: A Framework for Advancing Instructional Excellence. The book draws on work from the TEval project, which has expanded to the NextGen TEval Alliance. More information, including samples from other universities of rubrics, protocols, reports, and other materials are available at TEval.net

A TQR may be a good fit if your department or college wants to:

• evaluate teaching using more than student feedback
• give instructors feedback they can act on
• define what quality teaching means in your own discipline
• bring consistency to how teaching is reviewed
• create research-informed processes for evaluating teaching

To learn more or explore the potential of opting in, contact us at IRdata@msu.edu