Information for Tenure and Promotion Initiators and Candidates on Student Evaluation of Teaching
Brief Overview of Student Evaluations in Tenure and Promotion Reviews
A candidate's dossier includes the following information from students concerning the quality of the candidate's teaching:
- Copies of evaluation forms completed by a sample of current students
and recent alumni who took one or more courses (or other instructional
experiences) with the candidate.
- A narrative summary of the students' evaluations prepared by a
student committee convened on behalf of the candidate.
- A description of the sample and a summary of the quantitative results of the students' evaluations prepared by E&A.
The student evaluation component of the tenure and promotion review process commences in the spring prior to the year of the review. The initiator, the candidate, and the tenured members of the department collaborate to select the three-person student committee, to design a sampling procedure, and to develop additional questions for the evaluation form tailored to the specific teaching responsibilities and practices of the candidate. During the summer and early fall, E&A sends the questionnaire to a sample of 60 students and alumni selected according to the sampling procedure specified the previous spring. E&A continues to solicit responses until a response rate of 60% or better has been achieved (or until the deadline for summarizing the results has passed). In mid-October, or as soon as the requisite number of responses have been received by E&A, the candidate's student committee prepares a narrative summary of the results for inclusion in the dossier, and E&A tabulates the quantitative results of the closed-ended items. The initiator places the original questionnaires, the student committee's narrative summary, and E&A's sample description and quantitative tabulations into the candidate's dossier.
If there are any questions on any of the above, please contact E&A staff.
