Exploring Engineering Faculty Beliefs and Practices on Student Evaluation and Pedagogy

Evaluation of teaching is an integral component of engineering education that is designed to improve student learning and faculty practices. But the data and methods used to conduct evaluation can affect the way faculty make pedagogical choices. The purpose of this research is to explore the ways in which institutional evaluation approaches influence the perceptions and actions of engineering faculty and in particular, the way faculty use these data to make changes or improvements to their teaching. We ask the following question: How do engineering faculty beliefs and practices about pedagogy influence their perceptions of institutional evaluation methods? We conducted interviews with 29 engineering faculty at a high-research activity university in the Pacific Northwest. Using thematic analysis, we examined beliefs and practices related to pedagogy and evaluation. Findings are presented in terms of four major themes: (1) pedagogy beliefs, (2) pedagogy practices, (3) evaluation beliefs, and (4) evaluation practices. Faculty beliefs about teaching inform a range of responses related to their concrete practices in the classroom. At the same time, however, faculty were unsure as to whether institutional evaluation practices offered meaningful insight regarding their effectiveness as educators. Findings suggest that while faculty recognize the importance and value of different evaluation methods and recognize the role of evaluation in improving their teaching, they also identify a range of challenges associated with existing measures common to most universities. Given the range of purposes that evaluation data is designed to serve, and the fact that the same data might be used to offer both formative and summative feedback, the authors recommend aligning evaluation practices and instruments with evidence-based instructional strategies which are responsive to the contexts in which they are deployed.