Effective Faculty Evaluation:
Annual Salary Adjustments,
Tenure and Promotion

Chapter 1. Purposes of Evaluation

A primary function of formal assessment within the University is to produce what are known as summative evaluations. As the term suggests, summative evaluations come at the conclusion of an activity (e.g. a faculty member's evaluation year), and they are intended to produce judgments on the adequacy or effectiveness of the activity. Summative evaluations thus lend themselves to providing a basis for personnel decisions such as merit salary raises, promotion and tenure. The evaluations help to assure that the personnel decisions are reasonable and defensible and that they foster excellence. Summative evaluation is most effective when it is conducted with the cooperation and participation of those being evaluated.

A second type of assessment is formative evaluation, which is intended to provide feedback for changing the activity being evaluated while it is still in progress. Often less formal in design, this type of evaluation serves the vital purpose of faculty development or professional improvement. This too is critical to the pursuit of institutional excellence, so formative evaluation should be a major concern of unit faculty and heads. Formative evaluation can never be successful without the cooperation and participation of the faculty member being evaluated.

Both kinds of evaluation are vitally important, but the mandate to provide sound and defensible tenure, promotion, and salary recommendations clearly dictates that the systems devised by departments for this purpose shall be summative in focus. Faculty development and improvement are also desirable ends, and the report a faculty member receives for one year's summative evaluation can also be formative with respect to later years or to the pursuit of promotion and tenure. Nevertheless, all parties concerned should understand that the system that provides the basis for personnel decisions must be developed primarily to serve the institutional need to make personnel decisions. Therefore, no unit should sacrifice effectiveness or accuracy in summative evaluations to achieve formative goals.

The desire to develop a system that will simultaneously serve both summative and formative ends is understandable, but results of attempts along these lines are generally less than satisfactory for each purpose. Professional evaluators strongly advise that formative ans summative evaluations be conducted separately because their focus, purpose, and timing differ as do the role of the evaluator and the kinds of information needed. For example, an evaluation system designed to provide a basis for personnel decisions cannot offer the unthreatening context in which faculty members can get help toward professional improvement. Similarly, a system intended to create a safe situation in which people can reveal their weaknesses in order to receive assistance is incompatible with the perceived threat of decisions regarding salaries, promotion, and tenure.

Conventional wisdom therefore holds that formative and summative evaluations should be distinctly separated. One way to achieve this is to divide the responsibility for them. The unit head is required to conduct summative assessments, but in some cases an external agency can contribute formative assistance. In particular, the Office of Educational Improvement can provide independent and confidential help to faculty members who wish to strengthen their instructional abilities.

Sometimes confusion arises concerning the data useful for summative and formative evaluation. Some kinds of data serve one purpose better than the other. Thus, observation of teaching is better for formative evaluation, while student ratings on TEVAL are better for summative purposes. However, some kinds of data (e.g., publications, IDEA ratings, assessment of tests, and evaluation of syllabi) can very effectively serve both purposes.

Evaluators must act ethically. In particular, faculty members should show in advance how the data they submit will be used. They must provide any information required by the summative evaluation system, an those data may be considered in the evaluation. However, a person who reveals evidence beyond what is required in the hope of obtaining assistance in improving performance has a need and a right to know whether that information might also be used to make or to support personnel decisions.