Alternatives to SRTE

I received some valuable info in my email this morning (shared by Jackie Bortiatynski) on alternative methods to measure teaching effectiveness which I think could be useful right now on campus as part of a larger conversation about how to document good teaching. Hopefully people have also had a chance to read the Schreyer Institute’s report on the effective use of SRTEs.

Our faculty satisfaction survey from Fall 2015 made it clear that a majority of full- (56%) and part-time faculty (60%) were unsure or dissatisfied with the usefulness and accuracy of SRTE’s as a measure. As a result, many people feel pretty vulnerable about it being used as the only tool to evaluate teaching effectiveness.

It is always better to have multiple sources of data – to provide more context around what happens in your classroom, especially if you feel the SRTE data isn’t really describing your situation/work accurately.

Take a look at two different resources: KU Framework and  UC Boulder (Ernest Boyer) Framework. Each has a pretty simple rubric to help you get started.

I’m thinking that a good place to start for anyone could be to simply use either attached rubric to complete a self-assessment, followed by a brief reflection on the experience. This act alone could be very useful to anyone teaching to have a moment to consider their approach to teaching. This could be very useful in several ways: 1) enhance your conversation at your pre-March conferences, 2) give you useful talking points in your teaching narrative or FT1/FTM promotion documentation, 3) direct any future professional development choices related to teaching, or 4) add context to your annual assessment report for your disciplines.

If anyone would like to talk more about this, please let me know. If you’d like to meet as a group to explore these resources and try them in your own teaching, we can start a learning community around this topic. The end of the semester is a good time to take a benchmark of what’s happening – that gives you the spring to make any changes that you think can improve what’s happening.

Please get in touch if you have interest/questions!

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