[Teaching_Composition] teaching portfolios and faculty discussions

[Doug Downs]

Amy, is it the experience of your program that the portfolio system creates some exigence for faculty development among part-time instructors themselves?  

Here's the source of my question: currently our part-time instructors are assessed primarily by observation alone rather than by a full-fledged portfolio (that, presumably, would include peer and supervisor obvservations?).  Also currently, we really struggle to get participation in monthly development meetings even as we've gone from a top-down, "programmatic" design to a model more reminiscent of yours, peer-to-peer collaborative discussions on questions posed by instructors.  This is in part because we can't make the meetings worthwhile enough for a significant portion of our instructors, in part because scheduling is just hell and it's fairly easy to say no to the meetings not just for real conflicts but for a busy night of _Lost_ and _Deal or No Deal_.  

So I guess I'm wondering, directly, is a "looming" portfolio a sort of incentive for those (in our program, I would say 1/3d to 1/2) who do not seem to have the self-incentive to join these discussions and just "talk teaching"?  Just curious what you've observed.  To be blunt, some of our faculty would see the portfolio as a carrot.  Can it also be seen as a stick?

Cheers --
Doug


Dr. Doug Downs
Asst. Professor, Composition & Rhetoric
Dept. of English and Literature
Utah Valley State College
800 W University Pkwy, Orem UT 84058
LA 114w
801-863-8572