Faculty's Incorporating Learning Outcomes

Topic: Faculty's Incorporating Learning Outcomes Into PE Review Course

Audience: PE Review Course Faculty - average faculty member has been teaching their topic in this program for 7 years

Description: I joined my organization four years ago with the directive to legitimize their fledgling corporate university. One of the long standing programs is the Professional Engineering Exam Review Course. It runs annually for 13 Saturdays and utilizes 10 different instructors, most of whom have been teaching their topic for many years for the program. The challenge has been getting the faculty to incorporate learning outcomes in their instruction. Last year, all were required to submit their learning outcomes and outline before their class, however only about half did so. Of those who did submit the outcomes, only a few actually incorporated the in their class. My mini assessment evaluated the data collected from first hand observation (I attended the first portions of each of the courses this past year), the student evaluations and the course files, and the learning outcomes submitted.

The results are not surprising - those faculty that incorporated the learning outcomes in the classroom received the most favorable student evaluations. However, there was not any difference between those faculty who submitted their learning outcomes, but didn't teach to them, and those who didn't submit their learning outcomes.

My conclusion is that in addition to training on learning outcomes and assessment, the faculty need an incentive to submit and incorporate learning outcomes in their course. First, it will be written into their contract, and secondly those with the lowest student evaluation scores will be required to take the training or they will be replaced.