Evaluating Teaching in Online Programs: Comparing Faculty Self-Assessment and Student Opinion
ISBN: 978-1-78190-060-4, eISBN: 978-1-78190-061-1
Publication date: 9 August 2012
Abstract
This chapter compares faculty self-assessment of teaching with student opinion of instruction in an online environment, in order to determine the level of agreement between faculty self-assessment and student assessment, in areas of overall program strength and directions for individual and whole-group professional development. A faculty self-assessment of teaching inventory based on established guidelines was administered to participating faculty in the Master of Library Science program at East Carolina University, and scores were compared to students’ ratings of instruction for one academic year. Scores were corrected for bias, tabulated, and Pearson correlation and t-scores were calculated. The method used produced an effective benchmarking and diagnostic tool, and indicated directions for instructional improvement. Because the study was for the express purpose of internal, formative evaluation, model data tabulations are presented as examples only. Data from the actual study are not presented. Limitations of the study are that items on student evaluation of teaching surveys may not always lend themselves to concept mapping, and that data were collected only for one academic year in a single program. The chapter contributes a method that is replicable and scalable, demonstrates that data are relatively easy to acquire, and that procedures are simple to implement, requiring only basic statistical tests and measures for analysis. Results can be interpreted and understood without extensive knowledge of quantitative methods. There are few studies that compare students teaching evaluations with faculty self-evaluations, and none that specifically address it for library and information science education programs.
Keywords
Citation
Munde, G.M. (2012), "Evaluating Teaching in Online Programs: Comparing Faculty Self-Assessment and Student Opinion", Woodsworth, A. and Penniman, W.D. (Ed.) Advances in Librarianship (Advances in Librarianship, Vol. 35), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 151-173. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0065-2830(2012)0000035011
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2012, Emerald Group Publishing Limited