Psychological research, it is suggested, has made significant contributions to Canadian higher education. Cognition and learning, the measurement of student abilities, instruction, the evaluation of teaching, student characteristics, the organization and operation of the university, and program evaluation are examined. (Author/MLW)

Discusses problems with summative peer evaluation of college teaching, looking at conflicting interests and mixed metaphors of faculty evaluation that obscure its process and principles. Issues related to five kinds of evaluation (judging, critiquing, assessing, appraising, rating) are examined. Argues that peers can contribute to faculty…

In 1993, the University of North Carolina at Charlotte's governing board mandated peer evaluation for nontenured faculty. Participants in the American Association for Higher Education's peer review project feared the mandate would taint efforts to introduce faculty to collegial approaches to peer review. However, negative fallout from the mandate…

A discussion of faculty tenure focuses on the system used at Colby College (Maine). Policies and practices are described, with attention given to the four evaluations made before tenure is awarded, efforts to ensure instructional quality and research productivity after the tenure decision, and the balance of teaching and scholarship in the faculty…

A certification system for college faculty must effectively balance supply and demand, be criterion-referenced, choose criteria that command community confidence, be known throughout the market in which a given faculty member will operate, protect academic freedom, and provide a visible mark of distinction for faculty. While such a system has…

The American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy is developing a program to assist in teaching skills instruction for pharmaceutical faculty, help faculty assess their own and peers' teaching, create criteria for determining teaching excellence, and institute a certification system for the designation Master Teacher in Pharmaceutical Education.…

This book is designed to serve as a practical guide for the recruitment of college faculty. The 14 chapters are entitled: (1) "Recruiting in Higher Education"; (2) "Ethical Guidelines for Recruiting"; (3) "Planning: Taking Stock and Looking Ahead"; (4) "The Unique Nature of Your Position"; (5)…

This paper contends that the survey research approach is limited for generating substantive data to improve college teaching, because it is impersonal, lacks opportunities for probing, suppresses the idea of discourse by offering fixed-choice and yes-no questions, disregards respondents' social and personal contexts of meaning, and is dependent on…

Perspectives on the improvement of college instruction are offered. External forces that focus attention on the quality of college instruction are identified, including: the demand for good teaching by two groups of nontraditional students (low-performing students and adult students); technology, and especially new interactive technologies; the…

A study was conducted to develop a behaviorally anchored rating scale for the evaluation of college teaching that could be used in all academic areas and that would reduce leniency, central tendency, and other rater biases. The Smith-Kendall procedure was modified by having undergraduate subjects generate behavioral examples for specified levels…

Faculty members who write computer software for teaching often find that their chances of getting credit for it during promotion-and-tenure reviews are slim. Software development needs to be considered scholarship just like research. (MLW)

This report presents findings of a 1996-97 survey of 11 research and doctoral institutions to determine how faculty, department chairs, and academic deans perceive the balance between research and undergraduate teaching at their institutions. The institutions had responded to the same survey 5 years earlier as part of a larger study of 49…

A system for faculty evaluation is presented that suggests a performance middle ground appropriate to the realities of teaching while promoting the values associated with performance-based evaluation: measurability, objectivity, integration of performance with recognition and compensation, flexibility in application, discrimination among…

Five views of quality education are identified: the mystical, the reputational, the resources, the outcome, and the value-added. A new approach is proposed with the emphasis on good teaching, unpublicized student evaluations, and disinterested peer evaluation. (Author/MLW)

One University of Georgia business administration department has experimented with having faculty interview a fellow faculty member's students for insights into enhancing the learning environment inside and outside the peer faculty's classroom. A description of the program looks at how the interviews were conducted, the value of the interactions…