John Sinclair Thank you for sharing your views. I agree that quality of teaching can be defined in a many different ways, and that students can dedine it in a different way than teachers. Like you wrote, students can emphasize clarity, fairness, interest and some other aspects. In recruiting new teachers for departments, one criterion can be quality a sample lesson, and in this case, teachers and students can evaluate the quality lesson from the different viewpoints.

Thank you for bringing up the question. I think the quality of any activity, human endeavour can be assessed objectively, more the quality of teaching in the university system.

What the assessor will need to do is to develop an instrument for doing so, standardize it and make available for use by right stakeholders. To me, the best stakeholders to give unbiased assessment would be; .1. employers, 2. Parents, and 3. Students.

I think that the outcome of the assessment should even serve as a yardstick for giving or denying the teachers and professors incentives and rewards.

Maxwell E. Uduafemhe Thank you for promoting this discussion. You presented many good points. I agree that we need a good instrument that takes into account different aspects that are related to the quality of teaching. It is also a good idea to ask from stakeholders. Besides students, also employers can give valuable information.

Interesting topic.

Humberto Costa Thank you for the positive feedback.

Dear Raimo Kaasila a university student is not fully trained to assess the quality of the education he or she receives. This is because he will lean more towards sympathy or towards what he believes is more practical to apply in life. On the other hand, research should strengthen university teaching, but the truth is that of all that is published in journals, very little reaches the students. Without forgetting that quality is a very subjective concept.

I believe that a good way to begin an evaluation of "quality" is to review whether the curriculum corresponds to the competencies it is intended to achieve. We should also, among other aspects, review the working conditions of professors, the financing of university education, the number of students per professor, the amount of work, among others.

Gustavo Eduardo Toledo Lara Thank you for your valuable contribution, You presented many important points. I agree that often students are not enough well trained to assess the quality of teaching, and that usually students can't be awareof the main research findings that are related to the themes of courses. Your idea to review whether the curriculum corresponds to the competencies it is intended to achieve sounds good.

Well, for me it would be more like measuring the quality of learning of their graduates, that would give us an indication of the quality of teaching at a university.

Wilmer Lopez Thank you for sharing your views. I agree with you that the quality of students' learning indicates or reflects the quality of teaching. This is a good point.

I think students can provide feedback to the faculty, however this "measure" should be one of may facets (e.g., students performance, course work) used to assess a professor's quality of teaching. A combination of objective and subjective inputs may give a well-rounded assessment.

Interesting topic. I think it is possible to measure objectively the quality of teaching at universities. However, it depends on the instruments, the assessment methodology, and who is doing the measuring. For measuring the quality of teaching it is required planningwell-prepared planing and has to be conducted by several actors.

Crystal Maraj Thank you for presenting very good points. I agree that a combination of objective and subjective inputs may give a well-rounded and fairer assessment. Student feedback is useful but if we want to assess also some other aspects, like the role of relevant research in teaching, we need also other informants.

Arlinda Beka Thank you for the positive feedback and valuable contribution in this discussion. I agree that these three factors that you mentioned are very important. We need good instruments and relevant assessment methodologies. We need student feedback but also other experts who are able to evaluate the quality of teaching in a versatile way.

If one uses a dialogical teaching method where the lecturer is not seen as the fountain of all knowledge and students are encouraged to question established orthodoxies and to read widely on their own, most students should be able to tell if lectures are based on research findings or not. However, there will always be an element of subjectivity in assessing the quality of teaching. A reasonable degree of objectivity can still be attained through a multi-pronged approach involving (in addition to student feedback) peer observations, reviews of teaching dossiers by distinguished professors, the innovativeness of student dissertations and career successes of students after graduation.

Oswell Namasasu Thank you for promoting this discussion. You presented good points. I agree with you that dialogical teaching method is useful. I also agree that there is always an element of subjectivity in assessing the quality of teaching.. I think that some students can be more aware of relevant research than others but still quite few students have deep understanding of it.

In outcome based education ciriculum, its every component has to be well structured. The structured assessment methods should define how to measure the quality of research based teaching objectively.

I fully agree with Arlinda Beka, to achieve the objectives measurement of quality of research teaching there has to be a well directed ciriculum to define the methods and tools. So task starts from ciriculum formation to continue with revision ('planning, well prepared planning') (which again ideally involves 'several actors').

Chowdhury/Chaudhury Meshkat Ahmed Thank you for sharing your views. I agree with you that we definitely need such structured assessment methods that define how to measure the quality of research based teaching. This is a good point.

The question about objective assessment the answer is NO! As one progresses through the retention, tenure, and promotion (RTP) course evaluations are important about the quality of the teaching. However, you will have those students who engage in a "group think" and can provide a biased or unfavorable evaluation because of their personal biases toward the professor. As one goes through the RTP process if there are those that have issues with the candidate they can be a negative influence on the committee and/or the next level of reviews.

Student course evaluations are another very biased assessment. If a student has not done well in a course or if they use excuses as a means to get around requirements and they are not met favorably, then they may provide a negative evaluation of the professor regardless of how accommodating the professor may have been.

While we like to think we do our best job, go above and beyond to work with our students there are those that you just can't satisfy regardless of what you do, and the results will be "the pen being mightier than the sword"! So the question of

"Can the quality of teaching at universities be measured objectively?" the answer is no!

Doris Yates Thank you for your contribution in this discussion. You presented many good arguments for the answer no. I agree that student course evaluations can include some bias, and that it is needed feedback also from experts in our field.

Yes quality of teaching could be measured objectively by students beca university teachers are expected to carry out a thorough research on their areas of professionalism to be able to be a master in it. Students know when a teacher teaches well bcos they are at the receiving end. Well assimilated topics treated gives room for objective appraisal of the teaching.

Doris Chinyere Obiano Thank you for sharing your views. It is very useful to get many replies that differ from each other because they are promoting this discussion.

Dear Raimo Kaasila

Thank you for the question and I think the answer is yes, but measuring quality of teaching objectively at any university can be secured if every teacher is making sure that he / she has a clear plan for each lecture's aims and objectives? On a personal level, I measure my teaching quality objectively by achieving three main aims at the end of each class and as follows:

1- Creative Lecturing Objective: where I explain new topics and information in a way that is accepted by different students background.

2- Proactive Tutorial Objective: Where I get my students involved in a direct discussion with me by raising questions or even disputing in a positive way.

3- Innovative Seminar Objective: Where I lead my students to form groups of their choice and work in teams where they can compete on some events related to the main topic.

Finally, I hope that I've added something to the previous answers.

Kind Regards

Mr. Rashad Brydan

University Lecturer

Head of Intl Projects & Agreements

Omar Almukhtar University / LIBYA

Email 1: [email protected]

Email 2: [email protected]

Facebook: Rashad Brydan

Twitter: @RashadBrydan1

Tel: 00218922887724

Tel: 00218918346440

COVID-19 TIPS: PLEASE KEEP PHYSICAL DISTANCING, WEAR A MASK, AVOID CROWDS, KEEP WASHING YOUR HANDS AND COUGH INTO A BENT ELBOW OR USE TISSUES.

Rashad Brydan Thank you for giving good contribution in this discussion. I agree that it is important that teachers are setting clear goals for their teaching, and also learning goals for their students. This can help students to evaluate how well teaching has promoted their learning. In this way, they also can evaluate the quality of teaching.

Exactly my friend and that's why I consider my students satisfaction as a strong indicator for my teaching objectives quality measurement.

Regards

Rashad Brydan

Rashad Brydan Thank you. I agree with you that students satisfaction is one important criterion when measuring the quality of teaching. But I think that besides it is also needed to take into account how well teaching is based on relevant research. And for this purpose we need experts who know well the research that is related to our teaching,

Thank you Raimo, l see where you coming from and l also believe that it's us lecturers who can be human resource developers in the HE sector and not just following the atypical methods of lecturing. I think we must be more student centered and go further to consult our students on regular basis about what they should be learning on focus also what Employability Skills they must be equipped with? taking into consideration the original planned learning outcomes. And therefore I believe that convincing our students to realize the importance of flipped learning should be one of our most important objectives to be successfully achieved especially during this tough period of COVID-19 family pandemics.

Thanks

Rashad

Rashad Brydan Thank you for your reply. I agree that we have many reasons to be student centered. You mentioned flipped learning that is very a good example of student centered teaching methods.

Thanks for your prompt reply Raimo and it's my pleasure to confirm that I'm impressed with your Finish (Related to Finland) communication skills in terms of dealing with important academic topics so thank you for that. Back to business, yes flipped learning is one of the newest methodologies for being student centered by shifting the focus of instruction from the tutors to students in order to put students' thoughts, interests and acknowledging first as central to the theoretical and practical learning experience. I spoke from my own prospective and you may add your feedback which is really valuable for me and your followers.

Rashad

Rashad Brydan Thank you for the positive feedback.

Any time my friend.

Yes, the quality of University education can be better.

Elvis Otobo Thank you for sharing your views. Yes, I agree that it is always need to do things in a better way at universities, and that there is many ways how to improve the quality of teaching.

yes, Indeed.

Halmat Faieeq D Mahmood Thank you for sharing your views.

The questions asks if it is possible to agree upon an "objective" criteria to measure university teaching quality! The difficulty is finding the common ground where all agree on setting the parameters of objectivity. This is far more complicated issue. Several universities take pride in getting quality assurance certificates but who or what is the tool for "measuring". Students' satisfaction is one but not enough. I think objectivity is extremely difficult if not even impossible!

Dear Ahmed

For being student centered l think that not only students satisfaction can be the key regarding the above broad question but also students final results can be more accurate indicator for measuring teachers performance objectively.

Finally, each University sets their own academic goals according to their ranking and level of education where high standard institutions believe in strategic facts, figures, theoretical and practical results and not in meaningless certificates.

Regards

Rashad Brydan

I believe so, but the crucial aspect to consider when quantifying performance, more than objectivity is the need to meet the rigors of statistical soundness --- so that the metric used could be empirically be relied upon. Additionally in assessment practice (which I have done for most of my 25 years of teaching and administration work in the university), a single measure, however, sound may not adequately give a holistic picture of the teaching performance domain/s of interest, hence I advocate for the use of qualitative/ authentic tools to ensure that we are not short-sighted and see beyond what quantities cannot measure.

Hennie Lomibao Thank you for your valuable contribution in this discussion. I agree with you that it is needed such measurement that relies on wide empirical evidence, and that using a single measure does not give enough relevant and holistic view of the quality of teaching. Thank you for lifting up these important points.

maybe this could help you :https://www.ofce.sciences-po.fr/blog/can-students-evaluate-teaching-quality-objectively/

No. Everybody has her (his) own learning and teaching style. Therefore, it is necessary to have the free choice of learning (teaching) partners. However, the basic facts of a subject can now be completely programmed (e.g. for self-learning and automatic assessment); such foundation courses (electronic textbooks) can be objectively measured, in terms of educational quality and simplicity. Unfortunately, much of the outdated bad pedagogics goes now electronic.

Bruno De Lièvre Thank you. The link for the blog that you sent is very useful. I agree that the three conditions mentionedin in the blog need to be verified. I pick up here two of them: the students are not biased in their judgments and assessments; and that the teachers cannot adopt strategic behaviours to secure good evaluations. These are very good points.

Anjna D. Bhardwaj Thank you for the positive feedback.I agree with you that many participants in this discussion have presented important and well argumented viewpoints.

Stephen I. Ternyik Thank you for sharing your views. It is useful to get more arguments also for the reply "No". I agree with you that everybody has her (his) own learning and teaching style. This thing and also the other issues that you mentioned support the reply "No". In all, this discussion shows very well how complex challenge is to try to measure the quality of teaching in a versatile way.

Dear Raimo Kaasila In most universities of India, objective assessment of teaching quality with minor variations is practiced. However, the criteria and the integrity of evaluator are of utmost importance. A majority opinion, albeit not unquestionable, can serve as a prima facie indicator of the teaching quality.

Best regards, AKC

Arbind K. Choudhary Thank you for your good contribution in this discussion. It is interesting to hear about the situation in universities of India. I agree with you that he criteria and the integrity of evaluator are very important.

Hola Raimo Kaasila, desde Latinoamérica, afirmo que si es posible o al menos en mi experiencia de mas de 15 años en Educación Superior. He empleado la valoración objetiva con la construcción de Rúbricas la inicio de cada periodo académico con los mismos estudiantes. La segunda herramienta es la simulación, donde se entregan unos casos y en trabajo colaborativo y con las rúbricas son los mismos chicos quienes se evalúan, yo solo paso a ser un co-evaluador

JoJo Pardey Duque Thank you for sharing your views, and telling about the situation in Latin America.

I think it is easy to evaluate teaching in higher education just by looking at a syllabus, teachers methods of teaching and evaluation systems and compare if course objectives and sometimes teachers slogan adapted to the quality of their teachings

Nazanin nazanin Hajimohammadtaghi Thank you for your reply. I agree with you that a syllabus, course objectives and teaching methods have an important role when measuring the quailty of teaching. On the other hand, this discussion has shown that measuring the quality includes also many challenges.

Dear Raimo Kaasila you know I think although university instructors are highly professionals but teachings methods has been traditional in may cases on the other hand creative teaching methods have made educational material transferred not properly. one problem I think is that there is a contraction between delivery methods and contents. what do you exactly by measuring you mean the result of a course and its output or students marks which part etc??

Nazanin nazanin Hajimohammadtaghi Thank you for your good contribution in this discussion. Your reply shows well that this is a complex issue that includes many sides

Raimo Kaasila your welcome I'm not sure but i think marks , the levels of students strength to apply what they already learned and how much they find related jobs make measurements more objectives and for the last statically reports will result in objectivity

Nazanin nazanin Hajimohammadtaghi Yes, one indicator of the quality of teaching can be related to students' work readiness skills.

Another thing guys, do the higher education quality measurement team need to collaborate with the employers in this regard? Don't we agree that employers are the only independent validator in thisregard? I think private and public employers can objectively and practically measure the quality of our graduates after examining their employability skills in real life.

John Sinclair hello it was interesting but all universities celebrate all students based on their marks and not what they have done exactly during a semester??? i think in some occasion or may be in higher education lecturers don't pay attention students individually and they just pay attention to final papers

Rashad Brydan Thank you for promoting this discussion. I agree with you and Nazanin nazanin Hajimohammadtaghi that employers` views are important. One example about this: teacher educators are often asking from principals (headmasters) at schools how they see the competences of new teachers. This gives valuable feedback for teacher educators and their units how to develop syllabus.

Ramiro Kaasila. Yes indeed my friend and in relation to syllabus development, we're part of a 5 years EU Tuning Project aiming to transfer the ECTS Higher Education structure/ Model to the Middle Eastern and North African Universities and one important critical success factor was agreed upon to build a solid and concrete BS/ BA program and that was including usable specific and generic employability skills in each unit making them subject to application from year one ,to equip our students with the needed professional skills. Therefore l, l believe that exams alone can't lead to objectively measure the quality of our students' achievement/ development to meet their employers needs and to be considered as assets to them.

Rashad Brydan Thank you. These practices that you mentioned sound good,

Rashad Brydan and Raimo Kaasila what is the best way to substitute with marking systems? because at the end the one who receive good marks will find better opportunities both in their career and academic life even though they are not competent enough ?

Dear Nazanin

Thank you for your feedback but l would argue that not in all countries that employers would be interested in recruiting new staff members because of their good marks? For instance, in the UK if you have no work experience you will stand a small chance to get the job you applied for even if your marks are extremely good. Why, because no clever employer would waste their time, money and efforts on me just because of my good qualification if l can't do the job for them!! It has to be both good quality of qualification supported with quality employability competencies.

Rashad

Rashad Brydan so can we say employers are better evaluator than instructors? if you how we can apply such methods in universities to better evaluate ?

@Nazanin nazanin I think if the right evaluation procedures are out in place, the employer, being the consumer of the graduates we produce, is in a much better stand point to tell where we have done it well as well as need to improve.

Maxwell E. Uduafemhe thank you for agreeing with me and that was my point because we can't ignore employers' role as they will be the end user of our (graduates) to allow them to put into real usage what we have been teaching them for many years. Only at that stage and only with their employers all graduates can translate what they have learnt into application to meet all stakeholders expectations. I'm afraid measuring quality objectively may take longer than expected though.

Rashad Brydan and Nazanin nazanin Hajimohammadtaghi and Maxwell E. Uduafemhe Thank you for sharing your views. I think that if we want to assess the quality of teaching in a versatile way, we need to take into account views different evaluators. Employers' feedback is useful but we need also student feedback, and in addition, we need such experts' feedback who are able to evaluate how well teacing is based on relevant research.

Dear Nazanin Nazanin and Rashad Brydan,

When we formulate an out come based (OBE) curriculum, we have to take opnion from the stakeholders. The employers (one of the major stakeholders) definitely has to play a role in process of competence of a graduate in order to obtian the '"skill" of an employee that they are looking for. And as we know the OBE ciriculum addresses all there domains viz knowledge, skill and attitude, the relative proportion of each domains in each discipline can dictated by the stakeholders during formation of ciriculum.

The OBE Ciriculum also make structure of work base assesments in day to day practice of their learing. Which ought to produce the knowledgeable and skill graduate with ample of social skill to generate effective out come of his learning.

Again in OBE, where students are at the centre of learning, we prefer to use the term facilitator rather than the term teachers or instructor.

The role of the facilitator is to arranged tools and environment for learning, passively involve to make the students play pivotal role in whole learning process which eventually will lead the students to involve increative learning as well as reflective learning.

So the 'teachers' job can be objectively measured in the whole process, which it self based on a well structure, as defined by the ciriculum.

And to me it appears that teachers assesment even if they done by the student will not be biased. Rather the assesment tools that the students will adopt, eventually will reflect another skill of a student.

So if I may have a conclusion, OBE ciriculum meets all the modern days teaching and learning objectives.

The problem is to formulate and revise the ciriculum which need much time, dedication and involvement of actors from different sections.

And involvement of a teacher in a similar fashion to the involvement of the students.

Nazanin nazanin Hajimohammadtaghi. Thanks for your question but it's not a matter of comparing who's a better evaluator an employer or the instructor? Why do you see them non related to achieving same end in mind? I believe for producing better and more skillful graduates we can't ignore employers' saying in terms of syllabus development and choosing the required employ-ability skills that must be embedded in all units of our undergraduate programs.

so success will be an objective measure? although its a multi faceted concept

Chowdhury/Chaudhury Meshkat Ahmed and Raimo Kaasila and Nazanin nazanin Hajimohammadtaghi. Thanks a million for your outstanding feedback and great contribution but also according to my global experience I think there are five stakeholder that must be involved while improving or assessing the quality of teaching, learning outcomes, required employ-ability skills, soft and hard skills,,, ect. And them stakeholders are:

1- Educators / Instructors.

2- Students.

3- Graduates. (to consult them on how did they perform?)

4- Employers.

5- Independent Professionals.

Regards

Rashad

Dear Nazanin Nazanin,

Let me give an example, how we can (or students) assess the quality of a 'teacher' (actually a facilitator).

If we fix the learning objectives of hypertension, that the students 'will be able to manage a patient with hypertension' . Then what the teacher will objectively do to facilitate the learning process.

1. He will have to organise a hypertension clinic.

2. He should stratify his patients into simple, case, complicated case and masked case.

3.He will assess through the medical records if the students can take history and examine the patients properly. If he can choose proper investigations accordingly. And finally give evidence based medicine and advice the patients with dignity and effectivity.

So this part of teachers can measured effectively. (if he acompany the process, . give feedback, check the records,).

If all these items are structured in teachers assessment tool, then it should not be difficult to assess the teacher objectively.

Of course there may be a question how the students judges the knowledge and skills of the teacher?

In student centred learning actully the process of learning goes in way of leatning together (meaning both students and teachers). The system is built in a manner that students role is more dominent and the role of a teacher is to create an environment.

So it is not difficult to assess objectively the quality of a teacher.

Chowdhury/Chaudhury Meshkat Ahmed Thank you for your valuable contribution in this discussion. You presented many good ideas and practices that are useful.

Rashad Brydan I agree with you that the list of the stakeholders that you presented is relevant when measuring the quality of teaching.

Dear All

Thank you for sharing your valuable thoughts and going back to my presented list of consulting stakeholders (Educators / Instructors, Students, Graduates, Employers and Independent Professionals) can't you see that they are internal and external validators? So I believe that they can apply SWOT analysis methodology or a similar model to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats regarding our teaching goals, quality, application and learning in-out-comes. What do you think?

Rashad Brydan Thank you. I agree that these consulting stakeholders can apply SWOT analysis or some other model to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. And in this case, Independent Professionals should have a strong researcher background. In this way, they are able to evaluate how well teaching is based on relevant research.

Raimo Kaasila. Thank you for appreciating my lecturing evolution method and l believe it would also help Higher Education policy makers to improve the sector's quality assurance in terms of current and future plans and strategies to increase the quality of all parties who are involved or related to the Teaching Process Improvement and they are:

1- Lecturers / educators

2- Students / graduates

3- Uni Staff Members

4- Sector's Employers

5- Independent Professionals.

6- Organization's Equipment and facilities.

Last but not least, l believe that improving or measuring lecturing quality objectively requires working on different levels; individual and organizational, internally and externally.!!

Thinking of your question keeps fuelling my brain with different and new Answers and Creative Models so many thanks for this creative question that's leading to creative and strategic answer.

Rashad Brydan Thank you. In all, I am glad that this discussion has produced so many relevant ideas about the best practices in different countries.

https://www.ofce.sciences-po.fr/blog/can-students-evaluate-teaching-quality-objectively/

Article Measuring teaching quality in higher education: assessing se...

Also see this :

https://www.tripurauniv.ac.in/Content/pdf/Distance%20Education%20Notice/Measurement%20and%20Evaluation%20in%20Education%20_%20MA-Edu%20_%20ED-804%20E%20_%20English_21072017.pdf

In case of applied well-designed regulations can be done

Ranjan Parekh Thank you for your valuable contribution in this discussion. The blog is useful. Also the article that you shared shows well what kind of bias measuring the quality of teaching can include.

Bestoon Faraj Thank you for sharing your views.

George Stoica

Good morning

In my opinion, it depends on the country, we are talking about.

Which international organizations are evaluated it? How do they do?

As a professor, I believe in sharing knowledge and less magister classes. Also, we prepper students for a future and I will be happy if they can find a job with quality

Best regards

Ph.D. Ingrid del Valle García Carreño

In the past, when there were about 80-100 at the University in one year, there were exams and evaluation in the form of a professor-one student, or a professor-three students. I liked such exams a lot and they gave the possibility of a reliable assessment. It took 7-10 days, but it was very satisfying. However, when there are 500 students, written tests remain.

Ingrid Del Valle García Carreño Thank you. You presented many good questions and points. I agree with you that in different countries, there are different evaluation systems, and that it is a great benefit if well known international organizations are evaluating the quality. This discussion has shown well that also employers` views are important.

Mirosław Grzesik Thank you foe sharing your views. I agree with you that nowadays at universities there are too many students per professor, and this reflects in teacher-student relationship in many ways, This has also lead to many challenges when trying to utilize student feedback in an effective way

It is rather difficult to assess the quality of teaching. The universities are evaluated mainly by the results of scientific community research.

Thank you for sharing your views Bogdan Socea I agree with you that measuring the quality of teaching is more difficult than measuring the quality of research but also the latter includes some challenges.

The short and long answer to the question is NO! Those who write and review course evaluations, and those who review the Retention, Tenure, and Promotion documents may have an agenda therefore the evaluations are very subjective.

Doris Yates Thank you for your contribution in this discussion. I agree that course evaluations include subjective aspects.

Yes sir. Proper evaluation system by the students as well as fellow colleagues must be made based on operational goals with impactful outcomes. Criterion depends on subjects.