Preamble: This motion codifies the principles for Teaching Evaluation which the CIET committee was charged to bring to the Senate in motion 17/18-19. The motion describes a system of teaching evaluation that includes multiple sources of evidence (from students, peers and faculty themselves) to evaluate faculty against consistent standards (professional, inclusive, engaged and research-informed teaching). The intended benefit of this policy is to clarify and improve systems of teaching evaluation across the department, college, and university levels and align these where appropriate.  

Section I  

1.1 WHEREAS: the Senate has undertaken a multi-year effort to examine and improve UO’s teaching evaluation instruments and practices toward “reducing biases and improving validity, with the goal of improving teaching, learning, and equity” (US16/17-28);  

1.2 WHEREAS: this work has been guided by principles that teaching evaluation should be a) fair and transparent, b) conducted against a clear definition of teaching excellence and aligned criteria, and c) informed by data collected from peers, students, and instructors themselves;   

1.3 WHEREAS: using transparent, consistent criteria and multiple data sources are evidence-based approaches to reducing the impact of bias in the evaluation of teaching, acknowledging that this is just one part of a larger University effort to combat and reduce bias;     

1.4 WHEREAS: using transparent, consistent criteria helps ensure faculty know what they’re being evaluated on and gives them an opportunity to work toward those goals;    

1.5 WHEREAS: professional, inclusive, engaged, and research-informed teaching are broad but meaningful standards now used by the Senate’s Continuous Improvement and Evaluation of Teaching Committee, promotion and tenure committees, the Teaching Engagement Program, the Provost’s Teaching Academy, teaching awards committees, the 2019 MOU between the United Academics and the Administration, and others at UO to describe quality teaching;      

1.6 WHEREAS: these standards allow for discipline-specific pedagogical methods;      

1.7 WHEREAS: UO now can consider qualitative data from peers, students, and instructors themselves aligned to standards rather than numerical rankings that compare faculty to one another through departmental and university averages that may be affected by bias;    

Section II  

2.1 THEREFORE BE IT MOVED: Teaching Evaluation is the formal process of evaluating teaching quality, including for promotion, tenure, merit, regular performance review and improvement, and teaching awards. This evaluation must include the available evidence from multiple sources (including peers, students, and instructors themselves) assessed, at a minimum, against the four standards of professional, inclusive, engaged and research-informed teaching. Evidence will be drawn from all parts of a course for which an instructor is responsible (including labs, discussions, etc.). Units will operationalize the evaluation of teaching through development of unit specific Teaching Evaluation Rubrics. Units may organize their rubric to be consistent with their unit’s pedagogical values, including the addition of other standards. The unit’s Teaching Evaluation Rubric must name the standards, sources of evidence, and the criteria for meeting, exceeding or not meeting expectations.  

2.2 BE IT FURTHER MOVED THAT: Units that submit their rubric and related revisions to unit policies, approved by their Dean, to the Office of the Provost no later than April 1, 2022, for Fall 2022 will have them used at all levels of teaching evaluation beginning in Fall 2022. Until their rubric is approved, units shall continue evaluation of teaching in alignment with current University policy.   

2.3 BE IT FURTHER MOVED THAT: The Office of the Provost will provide workshops and trainings to support faculty, personnel committees and unit heads as they undergo this transition in teaching evaluation practices. The Teaching Engagement Program will support units in developing their Teaching Evaluation Rubric and other materials such as sample Peer Review templates.  

2.4 BE IT FURTHER MOVED THAT: The UO tools (Student Experience Surveys, Instructor Reflection) and data reporting systems (Cognos Teaching Summary Report and Teaching Detail Report) that support units as they evaluate teaching shall be reviewed biannually by the Senate Continuous Improvement and Evaluation of Teaching (CIET) Committee and presented to the Senate as part of an organized process of ongoing implementation, iteration, and improvement. The CIET’s reports will address the effectiveness and potential for bias, as well as its financial and time commitment costs.