Professional Growth Through Peer Conversations: Adapting a Teaching Framework

It started with a simple question: “How do we evaluate and document teaching?” What followed was not just an adaptation of a framework and evaluation tool but our own professional development with unexpected insights, shared experiences, and a renewed energy for teaching. With the goal of clarifying evaluation of teaching, we began to look at the Benchmarks for Teaching Effectiveness provided by the Center for Teaching Excellence (CTE) at the University of Kansas. The CTE Benchmarks have been developed as a comprehensive framework for evaluating teaching across seven dimensions: (1) Goals, Content, and Alignment; (2) Teaching Practices; (3) Achievement of Learning Outcomes; (4) Class Climate; (5) Reflection and Iterative Growth; (6) Mentoring and Advising; and (7) Involvement in Teaching Service, Scholarship, or Community.