Department of English
Southern Connecticut State University
September 3, 2004
Reappointment
Article 4.6 of the AAUP contract states that ³part-time members shall be assigned to available courses depending on the department chairpersonıs determination of credentials, experience, and teaching merit. When the chair determines that part-time members have similar credentials, experience, and teaching merit, the chair shall recommend for appointment the person with the greatest length of service in the department.²
While records of degrees earned and credit hours taught are easily kept, the number of part-time faculty in the English Department precludes the chair from personally determining each part-time faculty memberıs teaching merit. The Peer Evaluation Committee evaluates part-time faculty membersı teaching performance and reports its evaluations to the chair. The chair uses this report to make reappointment decisions about part-time faculty members each semester. The PECıs work is similar in purpose to the work of the Department Evaluation Committee, which evaluates full-time faculty for renewal, promotion, and tenure.
The PEC has several additional goals: to identify the strengths in our colleagueıs teaching work, to learn from those strengths ourselves, and to communicate our colleagueıs strengths and expertise to others. The process described below is one that part-time faculty and members of the PEC have developed and revised over time to achieve these goals. It is a process intended to create opportunities for faculty to exchange and develop our ideas about what teaching theories and practices have positive consequences for our students.
Membership
The Peer Evaluation Committee (PEC) is an elected committee comprised of at least 2 part-time (PT) faculty members, at least 4 full-time (FT) faculty members, and the Composition Faculty Development Coordinator, who will serve as Chair. All full-time faculty members are eligible to serve. All part-time faculty members who have taught 9 or more credit hours at SCSU are eligible to serve. PEC elections are held in the spring for the following year. Members typically serve a one-year term, but one-semester terms can be negotiated.
The PEC will meet as a group once during the first three weeks of the semester to finalize procedure and decide visitation assignments and once during that last two weeks of the semester to compose its report for the department Chair. Each PEC member will typically evaluate 2-4 PT faculty members per semester.
The PEC will evaluate each PT faculty member during his or her first semester teaching at SCSU and then once every two to three years thereafter, depending on the number of faculty to be evaluated and the number of faculty available to serve on the PEC. The PEC Chair updates and circulates an evaluation rotation each year. The PEC Chair consults with part-time faculty if their evaluation date needs to be changed and negotiates a suitable change. If a PT faculty member wishes to change their evaluation date, the chair will do his/her best to accommodate the PT faculty memberıs needs.
The PEC will notify PT faculty during the first three weeks of the semester in which they will be evaluated. PT faculty will be visited during a class session of their choosing between midterm and the twelfth week of the semester by two PEC members. They will have also have a follow-up conversation with the PEC members who did their visitation within that time frame.
By midterm of the semester in which his or her evaluation takes place, a PT faculty member should provide the PEC Chair with copies of the following teaching materials for the course and section in which their visitation will take place:
By the week of the classroom visitation, PT faculty should provide visitors with
PEC members will conduct their classroom observations in pairs and will each complete a ³Record of Visitation² form (attached). This evaluation form will be added to the teaching materials provided by the PT faculty member.
After visiting the PT faculty memberıs class, PEC members have a follow-up conversation of 30-45 minutes with the PT faculty member at a time mutually agreeable to all three. The conversation should be an equal exchange between all three, and should foreground the successful aspects of the course. The conversation should in part address how the departmentıs goals and objectives for the course inform the PT faculty memberıs teaching and course design. If there is any room for improvement in teaching performance, concerns should be balanced with concrete strategies and resources for making those improvements.
PT faculty being evaluated are welcome to add their own written response to the classroom observation and/or follow-up conversation to their file before the PECıs final meeting of the semester.
PEC members will make one of the following evaluations for each observed faculty member: excellent, good, average, or below average. Evaluations will be based on the classroom visitation, follow-up conversation, teaching materials provided, and any written response to the classroom observation and/or follow-up conversation the PT faculty member provides. The PECıs evaluation will be recorded on the ³PEC Report to Chair² form (attached).
If a PT faculty member is evaluated as ³below average,² the Chair has the option of declining to reappoint him or her. However, the PEC will generally recommend to the Chair that any PT faculty member who is evaluated as ³below average² have at least one semester to improve his or her performance.
If reappointed, PT faculty who are evaluated as ³below average² in their teaching performance will be reevaluated the following semester. The Department Chair and/or Assistant Chair may choose to do the follow-up classroom observation.
The chair of the PEC will report the PECıs evaluations of PT faculty to the PT faculty members evaluated and to the department Chair by the end of the semester. The department Chair will use the PECıs report to make decisions about reappointment and the number of sections assigned to a PT faculty member. The Chair may share the PECıs report with the Composition Program Coordinator when the Composition Coordinator is making teaching assignments.
The PECıs evaluation will not be used to make decisions about when a PT faculty member is scheduled to teach or when they are scheduled for office hours; scheduling preferences and office hour preferences will be accommodated in order of seniority.
PT faculty who receive an evaluation of ³excellent² from the PEC will be nominated by the PEC for an English Department teaching award.
PT faculty who receive an evaluation of ³excellent² or ³good² from the PEC will be encouraged to make one or more of the following contributions: sharing their syllabi and assignments on the English Department website, presenting at faculty development events, serving on appointed department committees related to curriculum development, and/or attending or presenting at conferences.
All PT faculty members are welcome to request a follow-up evaluation in a subsequent semester. PT faculty may request specific members of the PEC for a follow-up observation; requests will be honored whenever the requested PEC membersı schedules permit.
If reappointed, PT faculty who are evaluated as ³below average² in their teaching performance are encouraged to request any and all of the following resources before their follow-up evaluation: membership in a portfolio assessment group, consultations with faculty members of their choice, current scholarship on teaching the course in question, and permission to audit the Departmentıs graduate-level course in teaching composition (for PT faculty who teach composition courses).
PT faculty members being evaluated are welcome to request a letter of recommendation from the PEC members who observed him or her.
Access to PEC Files
PT faculty members being evaluated have access to all documents related to their observation at any time. The PEC Chair will keep a file for each part-time faculty member evaluated.
SCSU Department of English
Peer Evaluation Committee
Observerıs Name:
Class Observed:
Instructor:
Semester:
Date and Time:
Did class begin and end on time? Were the dayıs objectives clearly stated? Was there a sense that the observed class session logically followed previous sessions? Was it clear how the observed session prepared students for following class sessions?
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Were the activities for this class session effective? Did the sessionıs activities seem meaningful in the context of the syllabus and the sessionıs stated objectives?
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Did this instructor interact with his/her students effectively? Did the instructor seem prepared? Did students appear engaged during the different activities in this class session?
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Based on the teaching materials provided by the instructor and the class session observed, are current departmental goals and objectives for this course being met? What is especially commendable about the way in which this instructorıs course is informed by the goals and objectives? Is there room for improvement?
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Additional comments about the classroom observation
and/or follow-up discussion with the instructor (optional):
__________________________________ ____________________
Observerıs Signature Date
SCSU Department of English Peer Evaluation Committee
Fall 2004 Report to Chair
Evaluation of ______________________________ _______________
[faculty member] date
Overall teaching performance evaluated as:
excellent good average below
average
The strengths of [faculty memberıs] teaching performance include:
[Faculty member] is interested in developing the following aspects of his/her pedagogy:
________________________________ ______________________________
[faculty member] date Andrea
Beaudin
_____________________________________ _____________________________________
Clare Blatchley Ilene
Crawford, PEC chair
_____________________________________ _____________________________________
Nicole Fluhr Patti
Hanlon
_____________________________________ _____________________________________
Will Hochman Brandon
Hutchinson
_____________________________________ _____________________________________
Steve Larocco Steve
Listro
_____________________________________
Demian Pritchard