Guidelines for the Alignment of Indirect Measures of Teaching Performance: Triangular Perspectives of Students, Peer Faculty, and External Reviewers

Abstract

Direct and indirect assessments are the two intertwining aspects that can serve as our accountability toward our students in the betterment of their learning experiences. Direct assessments of learning allow teaching faculty to collect information regarding student academic progress using exams, quizzes, oral presentations, or projects, among other methods. In contrast, on an institutional level, indirect assessments of teaching performance provide analytically reported perceptions from various stakeholders on teaching and learning, such as peer review of teaching, student surveys, and external reviewers’ surveys. Indirect assessments may advise us on instructional improvement. As addressed in the assessment literature, good assessment practices should be valid, reliable, and able to triangulate one another. Since every assessment method may have biases and constraints, the use of the two types of assessments can provide us with the integrated affirmation of student learning. When direct assessments of learning fail, indirect assessments of teaching process may provide insights into to how to overcome the persisting problems. Current literature, by and large, focuses on direct and indirect classroom assessments of student learning. Indirect assessments of teaching process are also abundant in literature. However, the use of multiple indirect assessments of teaching process, specifically in aligning the different measures from the viewpoints of students, peer faculty, and external reviewers, has not been addressed in the literature. This article intends to address this issue. Being informed by the trigonal viewpoints will contribute to well-rounded assessments of teaching and learning.