Revised
Report:
Task Force on Teaching Excellence
Moving
toward excellence is always an ambitious undertaking, but it is especially so
when the task at hand mandates a move toward something as complex and
multifaceted as institutional excellence in teaching. To do so effectively
requires a number of things, including a healthy respect for both the past and
for diversity. It also requires a
willingness to take on the challenges of honest self-appraisal, along with the
strength and ability to face the realities of what is and is not presently
working.
The purpose and charge of this task force was to identify best practices that surround teaching excellence. That is, what does it mean to say we strive for teaching excellence? What are the institutional features that promote it? As we began to unpack this charge and to examine the underlying issues that might be involved, it quickly became clear that there were a number of interconnected questions and issues that needed to be addressed.
First on our list was arriving at a working definition for good teaching, the cornerstone of teaching excellence. Despite the potential for disagreement here, consensus was actually reached quickly. Although teaching is clearly as much art as it is science, there are some key elements that must be acknowledged and visible in any working definition of good teaching. These six elements have been summarized as follows: (cf., Enerson, 1997 and 2004; see /dept/cte/about/directormessage.html )
The
first is also the most
fundamental—good teaching is a complex process that begins and ends with
students. It takes into account who they are, what interests they already have,
and what they will need to know.
Second, good teaching, especially at the university level,
also requires a high level of subject matter expertise. Subject matter
expertise alone, we noted, is rarely sufficient however. Rather, the essence of good teaching is
found at the juncture of disciplinary and explanatory competence.
Third, good teaching is and can be highly
idiosyncratic. That is, the specific
details of what good teaching will look like can vary greatly. They will vary in part as a function of the
discipline, in part as a function of the teacher, and in part as a function of
the specific goals that are in place at a given time for a given group of
students.
Fourth, good teaching does not occur in a vacuum but is
contextually situated, which means that it can be affected by a host of factors
including class composition and size, as well as students prior knowledge and
course experience. Accordingly, good teaching requires feedback—both to and
from students. And it takes that
feedback seriously.
Fifth, good teaching is not a noun but a verb: a process
not a product. And in particular it is
an ongoing iterative process that involves careful planning, feedback,
analysis, and the courage to try again when things don’t go quite as expected.
These
first five lead naturally to the sixth element of our working
definition. But this sixth element isn’t merely an additional point to be made
but one different in kind. It simultaneously depends on and is derived
from the others. It is the element that
allows good teaching to become teaching excellence; it makes teaching
excellence possible. Namely, for good
teaching to become true excellence requires good community; it must be
purposeful, open, just, disciplined, caring and celebrative (Boyer, 1990). It is the ideal point where the whole
becomes greater than the sum of its parts.
But
how do we achieve this? As we pursued
these questions, we took as our starting point Nazareth’s long held tradition
of a commitment to teaching excellence.
But what precisely does it mean?
How is it most frequently expressed?
What were the practices that surround that excellence? Which of these
most clearly (and directly) support individual excellence? Which in the end will support institutional
excellence? We began with these questions and the premise that the
responsibility for teaching excellence was interdependent and twofold. That is, it occurs by virtue of the
interactions that occur between student and teacher, but also by virtue of the
institutional habits of practices that support, record, critique, and celebrate
those interactions.
So
what are those practices? What are the
visible traces of teaching excellence at Nazareth College? At many of our peer institutions, the
commitment to teaching excellence was varied and visible. A search of their WWW sites, for example,
revealed teaching awards, news articles describing in some detailing (and in a
sense celebrating) the work of a particular teacher or group of teachers. Tales
from the front lines, so to speak. At many institutions the search also turned
up a center such as our own newly developed Center for Teaching Excellence.
Having established the Center is a start in the right direction, but we clearly
could do more. At present, the focus seems more clearly designed to prevent bad
teaching, than to encourage or support teaching excellence. Where were the
documents and narratives that added details to the commitment? What were the
instructional traditions that foster and celebrate teaching excellence?
We
then looked at the specific practices that are part of the institutional ways
of documenting teaching. How you choose
to measure an activity such as teaching reveals a lot about the values and
assumptions that you are making about that activity. What data did we routinely
collect? What did those data tell us about our values and assumptions
surrounding teaching excellence? Many
of the existing practices seemed to have been designed for an early period in
the institution’s history, and perhaps even for a different definition of good
teaching. It seemed clear from our
discussions that during the past decade or so there had been a shift in the
definitions and goals for the classroom.
But what were the practices in place that were designed to help support
that shift and further the cause of good teaching, to celebrate it, and foster
it? How could the data we routinely collect pave the way for true
excellence? How might they contribute
to it?
First
on the list of data to be examined were the institutional routines that
surround the use of student evaluations, or IDEAs. The task force agreed that, like all instruments of this sort,
the IDEA is a rough and sometimes useful index of the teaching learning
process. But the entire field of
student evaluations is a controversial one.
Not all types of questions on student evaluations are equally useful and
valid as indicators of teaching excellence. For example, questions about “the
overall excellence of the teacher” generally are not as valid (or useful) as
are questions that ask students to report directly on their learning and
achievement of course goals. Thus, courses that use non-traditional teaching
methods typically will be rated lower than those that follow student
expectations.
Moreover,
practices surrounding the use and interpretation of the IDEA are problematic.
Practices are inconsistent and in some cases inappropriate. Making sense of the
data requires a good understanding of what is being displayed as well as
multiple levels of inference. Unfortunately, inferences too often are drawn
that go beyond what any instrument of this sort can do. Finally, the results do not always yield new
information. And when this is the case, it wastes both the faculty and students’
time. Feedback should be useful. Assuming good teaching can be defined by a
high IDEA score is circular and misleading.
Further,
we reflected on the inherent flaw in only documenting courses taught by
pre-tenure faculty. If student growth
and learning are the ultimate tests of teaching excellence, shouldn’t the
course, not the teacher, be the unit of analysis. Our present practices seem to
assume that once “credentialed” as a good teacher, good teaching is always
assured. This places too much emphasis on the teacher and not on the learner.
Finally, we considered the issue of peer review. Here again the practices seemed inadequate and inconsistent.
Current practices rest on occasional classroom visits, sometimes by a
department chair, sometimes not.
In
sum, we noted that many of the practices presently in place at Nazareth seemed
inadequate to the task at hand. The
data we routinely record does not tell the full story of teaching excellence at
Nazareth College. Much of it seemed designed to document and describe what the
teacher does, rather than what the student does. Yet if good teaching is that which enables and fosters student
learning, what are the ways that learning is recorded and expressed? Student
data about teaching are always essential.
The
discussion turned next to what might make a difference. Potentially, there are
three main sources of information about teaching—students, colleagues, and the
faculty member teaching a course. At
present, none seemed adequate to the task. The faculty data sheets and annual
written self-evaluations are no longer useful to the task they may originally
have been designed to accomplish. As we move forward with expansion and
reorganization, it is crucial that we have a more productive way to talk about,
define, document, evaluate and celebrate the teaching excellence that is so
clearly a part of the Nazareth tradition and history.
As
we face the simultaneous challenges of expansion and the changing demands of
the 21st century college, we need also to account for new issues of student
learning, new goals for and approaches to teaching, as well as the ways in
which computer technologies can make a difference. Among these many challenges will be: 1) finding ways to make
teaching more public, without violating the sacred domain of the classroom; 2)
moving away from the classroom as point for information transmission and more
into a space for shared problem solving; 3) discovering ways to document and
evaluate teaching that achieve a clear standard while still allowing for
disciplinary—as well as individual—diversity and strength; 4) systematically
exploring teaching issues that reveal and make evident all the aspect of
scholarships that are present; 5) viewing diversity as an asset; and 6) moving
forward as an institution striving for excellence as a collective, not as a
collection of individuals.
Finally,
we also agreed that an aggressive plan for change was needed. In a sense this report itself is the start
of such a plan. Its main treatise is
not that teaching excellence doesn’t exist at Nazareth College, but simply that
we do not have the data we need to support these claims. Our existing practices and habits
surrounding teaching activities and documentation supply too few meaningful
details. What are the problems that
students confront that can engage them in the learning processes? How are their existing notions of a subject
challenged by the courses they have taken here? In what ways can they imagine new ways of using what they have
learned to solve new problems? The data
at hand does not help us address those questions. What we may have in place are practices that are left from
another purpose, another era of teaching and learning at Nazareth College. We
must respect the past, but at this point we know we must also move
forward.
Accordingly,
this report has been intended not as a final set of rules to be followed but as
a “talking piece” for individuals—administrators as well as faculty—to reflect
on and consider the ways in which as an institution we could do a better job of
creating community (and thus excellence) around teaching and learning. And do a
better job, too, at telling the story of teaching excellence at Nazareth
College.
As a
committee, we offer two key recommendations:
I.
Strengthen
CTE in ways that will allow for both the promotion of teaching excellence and
also for its celebration at all levels of the College. To do this will involve
at least some or all of the following:
a. Establish a fund for teaching innovation grants administered by the Center for Teaching Excellence (e.g., transfer funds from VPAA) as part of the ongoing resource offered by the Center.
b.
Establish
and sponsor a teaching academy whose job it will be to explore:
1)
issues
surrounding the use of teaching portfolios both for development purposes and
for promotion and tenure;
2) issues of how classroom design affects pedagogy;
3) best ways to promote and ensure the smart use of information technology, etc.
c.
Establish
a regular publication (e.g., the Teaching Scholar) the purpose of which would
be to make public, recognize, and share a sample of the rich details that
surround the practice of teaching excellence at Nazareth College.
d.
Clarify
the role of the office of the Center for Teaching Excellence on issues of
teaching excellence.
II.
Establish
a Task Force on faculty evaluation that would:
a.
Report
to VPAA, Rank and Tenure Committee, and Faculty Executive Committee.
b.
Include
in its membership the director of the Center for Teaching Excellence, members
of Faculty Executive Committee, Rank & Tenure Committee, Faculty
Development Committee, Task Force on Teaching Excellence and other faculty as
seems appropriate.
c.
Begin
with the work of the Task Force on Teaching Excellence and this report.
d. Consider and reevaluate current year-end performance evaluations, peer review practices, and the use of the IDEA.
Respectfully submitted by the members of the Task Force on Teaching Excellence:
April Aerni
Diane Enerson, Chair
William Lammela
Cindy McPhail
Joseph Pestino
Roy Stein