Overview of Peer Teaching Evaluation Requirements

A peer review of teaching for all instructors should be conducted on a regular basis.  While peer evaluation can be requested more often if either the faculty member or department chair believe this is warranted, all faculty members with more than a trivial teaching commitment should have at least one peer review teaching evaluation a minimum of every other year.  It is strongly recommended that pre-promotion faculty members request at least one evaluation yearly.

Teaching evaluations can be used for instructor improvement and be kept confidential (i.e., between the evaluator and the faculty member being evaluated), or can be used for formal faculty evaluation and be submitted as part of a dossier to the department chair.  The type of review would depend on the needs and goals of the individual faculty member with input from the department chair.  It is expected that a minimum of one formal faculty evaluation be submitted in any 4 year time period for every faculty member.

To make these peer reviews possible, it will be necessary that all faculty members are willing to conduct reviews at the request of their colleagues or department chair.  Each faculty member with a teaching commitment should be willing to conduct at least one peer review each year. 

The reviewer may be chosen by either the faculty member being reviewed, or the faculty member undergoing review may ask the department chair to assign a faculty member to perform the review. Faculty review may be conducted by faculty outside of either the department of VMS, or outside of the CVM.

The department will provide general information and guidelines for both the faculty performing the review and undergoing the review.  Additionally, the department will provide recommended, but not required, forms for evaluation. 

Annual faculty update forms will ask specifically how many teaching reviews each faculty member has conducted, and how many evaluations they have had of their own teaching in the past year.

Checklist For Teaching Evaluators

Review general concepts of peer teaching evaluation before performing a peer review

Suggested resources include:

For peer observation of clinical teaching, observation of at least two rounds sessions and interviews with students from at least two different time periods is suggested.

For peer observation of classroom teaching, evaluation of test questions or assessment methods associated with the classroom teaching is suggested in addition to observation of classroom instruction.

Meet with faculty member prior to the evaluation

  • Discuss type of evaluation (informal vs formal; submitted to chair or kept confidential)
  • Discuss faculty member’s teaching philosophy 
  • Discuss how class or rotation fits into the overall veterinary education
  • Discuss the environment in which the evaluation will take place (e.g., classroom, rounds, lab)
  • Discuss the expectations of the instructor for the students (e.g., learning objectives)
  • Ask for any course or rotation teaching materials to be evaluated (eg, PowerPoints, notes)
  • Discuss how the evaluation will be performed, and what will be evaluated

Perform the evaluation

Meet with the faculty member within 2 weeks after the evaluation to discuss observations

In the case of formal evaluations provide a copy of the evaluation form used and any additional notes to the Department Chair.