Peer Review System at NUS

A new system of Peer Review (PR) will be implemented at NUS with effect from July 2001. PR is required of all Departments/ Programmes at NUS. The primary function of PR is to provide useful information to the administration for teacher appraisals for re-appointment, promotion, tenure, and teaching awards. In addition, it will also serve as useful feedback for the staff to improve his/her teaching.

The central features of the new scheme are:

1. There will be a comprehensive review which covers the entire spectrum of a teacher’s contribution to student learning, including
   • classroom teaching (lectures/ tutorial/seminars),
   • curriculum design,
   • printed and electronic teaching materials,
   • and assessment tasks (questions/problems for continuous assessment and final examination).
   Such reviews are necessary for critical administrative decisions (e.g., re-appointment, promotion, tenure, teaching awards).

2. Copies of PR reports will be given to the teachers under review as soon as the reports are completed. These reports should be included in the teaching portfolios submitted for tenure, promotion, re-appointment, and teaching excellence awards.

3. If a teacher feels that a particular peer review report is unfair or prejudiced, (s)he may defend herself/himself in writing on the negative points raised by the report. The teacher’s defense will be an integral part of the teacher appraisal exercise.

4. The responsibility of reviewing peers should be distributed to all members of staff with a minimum teaching experience of five years. For reviews to be effective, it would be best to select reviewers who have participated in seminars, dialogue sessions, or workshops on peer reviewing, conducted at CDTL or elsewhere.

5. As far as possible, at least two reviewers should be assigned to each teacher for a given PR exercise. Reviewers should be assigned to a teacher on a rotating basis across years.

6. Wherever possible, the reviewer should have sufficient familiarity with the subject matter of the modules being reviewed.

7. The reviewer and the candidate being reviewed should not be in competition for the same position.

Performance Appraisal, Teacher Appraisal and Peer Review

Peer Review fits into the scheme of evaluation of faculty members as follows:

1. Performance Appraisal for appointments, promotions and tenure. This includes the appraisal of scholarship, teaching, and service.

2. Teacher Appraisal as one of the three components of Performance Appraisal. Teacher appraisals for promotions and tenure are based on information provided by
   • Peer Reviews of the modules taught by the candidate,
   • Student Feedback,
   • Teaching Portfolio,
   • Interview with the candidate,
   • letters from students, alumni and colleagues,
   • interviews with students,
   • candidates reports on theses supervised,
   • interviews with supervisees, and so on.

3. Peer Review of modules, as part of the Teacher Appraisal. Peer Review includes review of classroom teaching, curriculum design, teaching materials, and assessment of the modules under review.

Teacher appraisal is required only for promotions and tenure. However, peer review of module is required for re-appointment and teaching awards.

Peer Review - The Checklist

This checklist for PR consists of a quantitative part and a qualitative part. The quantitative part yields a numerical score that corresponds to an overall evaluation of the teaching quality. The qualitative part provides feedback to the teacher and verbal evaluation on each item in the checklist and aspects of teaching quality not covered in the quantitative part.

The quantitative part will be evaluated on a five point scale, with values assigned as follows:

Part 1: Quantitative Evaluation

In the case of modules which are taught by a team, consider only the candidate's contribution for sections B-E.

1. Classroom Teaching

   1. Effectiveness of the classroom activity in facilitating learning
      Please make an overall estimate on the basis of considerations such as: Is the teacher simply reading aloud written lectures without additional elaboration? Could the purpose have been served better by making available to students copies of the written lecture? If the lecture is based on a textbook or article, would it have been better to require students to read the material and come prepared for a discussion?

   2. Effectiveness of the classroom activities in achieving the intended aims/objectives of the module
      “Aim” = what the teacher aims to teach in the module;
      “Objective” = what the teacher expects the students to be able to do at the end, as a result of the learning facilitated by the module.

   3. Degree of interaction facilitated by the teacher within the constraints of the class size.

   4. Quality of teacher’s exposition
      Please make an overall estimate on the basis of considerations such as clarity of explanation, whether or not the examples and analogies are appropriate and interesting, sequencing of items, etc.

   5. Quality of delivery
      Please make an overall estimate on the basis of considerations such as: clarity and audibility of voice, pitch variations to avoid monotony, eye contact, and appropriate use of audiovisual aids including IT. (This parameter is relevant only for lecture classes).

   6. Teacher's knowledge of the subject matter in relation to the content and aims/objectives of the module.

2. Curriculum Design
   

   (If the objectives and/or syllabus were formulated by someone other than the teacher being appraised, write x)

   7. Clarity of the statement of module aims/objectives.
      For instance, has it been made clear to the learners what they should know at the end of the module and what they should be able to do?

   8. Relevance and value of the items in the syllabus in terms of discipline specific goals.

   9. Relevance and value of the module objectives/aims to the overall goals of the subject.

   10. Relevance to the broad educational goals of the University.

   11. Relevance of the syllabus to the module objectives/aims.

3. Teaching Materials

   12. Adequacy and usefulness of the teaching materials (handouts, readings, videotapes, web pages, CD-ROMS, etc) for the learning required in the module.

4. Assessment

   (i) Continuous Assessment and Tutorials

   13. Overall value of the exercises (e.g., essays, tutorial exercises, assignments, quizzes, and projects) as learning experiences for students and as means of student assessment.

   14. Evidence of useful feedback from the teacher on student performance (on the basis of information gathered from students, and samples of corrected student work).

   (ii) Final Examination

   15. Appropriateness of the questions with respect to the knowledge content and skills and abilities specified in the module objectives/aims and syllabus.

   16. Overall quality of the design of the questions.
       Make an overall estimate on the basis of considerations such as:
       1. their discriminatory ability,
       2. balance of easy and challenging questions, and
       3. measures taken to guard against potential regurgitation,
       4. the thinking ability being probed into in the questions, etc.

5. General

   17. Overall quality of the module with respect to adequacy and depth of its knowledge content measured against the student background.

   18. Overall quality of the design and implementation of the module in developing the ability to apply knowledge to familiar and novel situations.

   19. Overall quality of the design and implementation of the module in facilitating the ability to learn independently of teachers and educational institutions, to think critically, to engage in independent inquiry, and to communicate clearly and precisely.

   Calculating the cumulative average score

   To calculate the overall score from questions 1 - 19, the average of scores for all the questions not marked as N/A is taken. The qualitative descriptions that correspond to the cumulative average score will be as follows:

   4.5 to 5.0:	Excellent
   3.5 to 4.4:	Good
   2.5 to 3.4:	Satisfactory
   1.5 to 2.4:	Unsatisfactory
   1:0 to 1.4:	Poor

Part 2. Qualitative Evaluation

Please attach a detailed report covering your perception of the main strengths and weaknesses of the module with respect to items 1 - 19 above, as well as aspects of teaching not covered by these items. In giving your comments, please bear in mind the external constraints not under the control of the teacher. It would be useful to clarify and justify the points you have awarded for each item.