The UBC Faculty Association (UBCFA) has come out against the use of student evaluations in determining tenure and promotions for faculty.
In a blog post made in late October, UBCFA called these forms of evaluation “grossly inadequate” and argued that they are often biased against women and minority professors.
The post also highlighted alternative evaluation methods, such as peer review of teaching, teaching practices inventories and instructor self-reflection, which the association argued could serve as an effective and less biased replacement of the current model.
UBCFA’s recent post is only a part of its broader push for the university to change the way these evaluations are used. The UBCFA could not comment on the post further as it is still amidst collective bargaining negotiations with the university.
Last year, UBCFA called for an “immediate, evidence-based review of the Student Evaluation of Teaching policy” as a result of a similar arbitration passed by Ryerson University.
The current policy, as outlined by the UBC Senate, states that student evaluations serve to help make decisions of salary, promotion, tenure and institutional recognition.
However, student evaluations aren’t all that is considered. Senate regulations also state that this method of assessment is to be used as part of a broader review, but the question is still raised about whether these methods should be used in the first place.
Critics of student evaluations argue against their validity in making employment-related decisions. Dr. Michelle Stack, a professor in the department of education, said the current way student evaluations are used can be quite problematic.
“The current form of them reinforces gendered and racialized ways of thinking and evaluating people,” said Stack. “It more negatively impacts racialized scholars, women and people that are sessional.”
She also said that studies have found these methods are an ineffective way to measure teaching performance.
“I mean we’re a university, let’s look at the academic research that these [student evaluations] don’t help learning and they don’t improve classroom experience for students in their current form,” said Stack.
In addition to the concern of bias, the UBCFA has also pointed to the evaluation’s low response rates as making them an unreliable indicator of faculty performance.
Dr. Sandra Mathison, a professor in the department of education and the co-editor of Critical Education, said that these low response rates are a big issue for the effectiveness of student evaluations.
“Oftentimes, and especially now that we’ve gone to an online system, the response rates are very low,” said Mathison. “The data that is included represents a relatively small number of students.”
But some faculty have raised the issue as to whether the UBCFA’s proposed alternatives are sufficient replacements to a more student-centered form of evaluation.
Stack said the UBCFA’s proposal doesn’t place enough emphasis on student feedback.
“What I would really like to see, and this I think the faculty association needs to do more of, is having students talk about what is going well and what’s not in classes,” said Stack.
In a similar vein, Mathison said that the UBCFA’s proposed changes might not have a sufficient single replacement for student evaluations.
“Even though the FA has offered up some of these other standard forms, I think that I would really exercise caution in saying that there’s any single strategy… that is likely to be appropriate and have the kind of validity for judging the quality of teaching that you would want to use in really serious personnel matters.”