Summarize the process of employment of new faculty and teaching staff to ensure that they are appropriately qualified and experienced for their teaching responsibilities.
Recruitment of new faculty members generally conforms to common practices and standard university procedures. It starts with the department coordinating with college administration to solicit and procure applications. The department selects their candidates based on a careful review of applicant CV. The college files requests of employment in accordance with the university’s human resources department.
Participation in Program Planning, Monitoring and Review
a. Explain the process for consultation with and involvement of teaching staff in monitoring program quality, annual review and planning for improvement.
Faculty involvement in program quality management occurs at 3 levels: ABET (Accreditation) Committee responsible for reporting on program quality, Curriculum Committee responsible for program content, and Department Council for final review and decisions.
b. Explain the process of the Advisory Committee (if applicable)
The Industrial Advisory Board (IAB) is a 2-year term industry-based committee intended to help FCIT ensure that the graduates of its bachelor programs better fit the needs of its employer stakeholders. The board members are leading non-academic professionals selected from a variety of backgrounds and industries that traditionally seek graduates of computing programs.
Board members generally advise FCIT on the needs of the job market, and the qualities that they seek when they hire. One of the most important roles of IAB is to help FCIT review and develop valuable educational objectives for its programs. Another important role is to help provide students with opportunities to gain some real world experience during their summer training and capstone coursework.
Professional Development
What arrangements are made for professional development of faculty and teaching staff for:
a. Improvement of skills in teaching and student assessment?
According to research and best practices, multiple and continuous assessment methods are required to verify student learning. Current trends incorporate a wide range of rubric assessment tools; including web-based student performance systems that apply rubrics, benchmarks, KPIs, and analysis.
b. Other professional development including knowledge of research and developments in their field of teaching specialty
According to research and best practices, multiple and continuous assessment methods are required to verify student learning. Current trends incorporate a wide range of rubric assessment tools; including web-based student performance systems that apply rubrics, benchmarks, KPIs, and analysis.
Describe the process used for orientation and induction of new, visiting or part time teaching staff to ensure full understanding of the program and the role of the course(s) they teach as components within it.
According to research and best practices, multiple and continuous assessment methods are required to verify student learning. Current trends incorporate a wide range of rubric assessment tools; including web-based student performance systems that apply rubrics, benchmarks, KPIs, and analysis.
Part Time and Visiting Faculty and Teaching Staff
Provide a summary of Program/Department/College/institution policy on appointment of part time and visiting teaching staff. (ie. Approvals required, selection process, proportion to total teaching staff, etc.)
a. What processes are used to evaluate and improve the strategies for developing learning outcomes in the different domains of learning? (eg. assessment of learning achieved, advice on consistency with learning theory for different types of learning, assessment of understanding and skill of teaching staff in using different strategies)
Details of assessment guidelines and processes are in an Assessment Guide published by the Academic Assessment Unit. Following is a summary of main points.
The continuous improvement cycle (assessment, evaluation, and improvement)is split into two parts with assignment of responsibilities for each to different parties:
Assessment is assigned to a dedicated college-level unit, called the Academic Assessment Unit.
Evaluation and improvement are assigned to assessment stakeholders such as course instructors, program heads, and curriculum committees.
Assessment (data collection in ABET terminology)has the following main characteristic:
It starts from observable actions by students at the course level, so called course learning outcomes (CLO).
It relies on a combination of direct and indirect measurements to produce and corroborate evidence.
It utilizes suitable sampling of performance data. For example, when assessing course outcomes performance we do not insist on collecting data for every assessment in every course for every semester. We believe less is more here. Good sampling can yield representative results while being sustainable and avoids overwhelming assessment administrators and stakeholders.
It is based on the actual scores (marks) obtained by students in exams and other assessment tools used to evaluate their learning. We don’t believe in using adjusted (curved) scores for outcome assessment as they can obscure actual student performance that is the basis of our outcome performance assessment.
We expect the following continuous improvement reports to be filed as follows.
End of semester, Course, Course Coordinator, Course file, Presented at 1st Department Council in following semester.
End of year, Program, ABET Committee, Program report, Presented at 1st Department Council of academic year.
The college has developed tools to facilitate program quality management, the most important of which is AIMS, for Accreditation Integration and Management System. It is an in-house electronic system that manages academic information of interest to accreditation. It was developed to relieve the faculty from the burden of dealing with tedious paperwork and allow them to concentrate their efforts instead on teaching/learning and on academic development activities. The system separates academic data from process thereby allowing the support of multiple accreditation-systems. Currently AIMS supports both ABET and the NCAAA.
b. What processes are used for evaluating the skills of faculty and teaching staff in using the planned strategies?
Primarily a combination of student surveys and focus group meetings as detailed in the Assessment Guide published by the college-level Academic Assessment Unit.
Overall Program Evaluation
a. What strategies are used in the program for obtaining assessments of the overall quality of the program and achievement of its intended learning outcomes:
(i) From current students and graduates of the program?
Primarily exitand alumni surveys based on well-articulated and communicated so-called Student Outcomes (exit competencies), and Program Education Objectives (PEO), respectively. Exit surveys target current students. Alumni
surveys target past graduates of 2 years or more.
(ii) From independent advisors and/or evaluator(s)?.
Primarily through seeking relevant international accreditation for program and feedback during annual meetings with the college’s Industrial Advisory Board. The program has been accredited by ABET (www.abet.org) as of August 2013.
(iii) From employers and/or other stakeholders.
Primarily through employer surveys, and consultation with members of the members of the Industrial Advisory Board who are selected to represent relevant community and employer stakeholders.
