THE TEACHING ACTIVITY REPORT
TEACHING DOSSIER PREPARATION
GUIDE FOR REGULAR FACULTY MEMBERS
Updated by the UVic Learning and Teaching Centre (2016)
INTRODUCTION
The teaching dossier is generally defined as a comprehensive summary of teaching
activities, contributions to student learning and teaching achievements. Similar to the
curriculum vita, it is a vehicle for presenting faculty members’ contributions to the
scholarly work of the university. If updated regularly, it becomes a cumulative record of
your contributions to student learning. As a cumulative and historical document, it is
essential to career processes such as reappointment, tenure and promotion, nomination for
teaching awards, application for teaching development grants and application to
academic and administrative positions, both internal and external to UVic.
What SHOULD the Teaching Dossier Contain?
Each Faculty has a formal Evaluation Policy that describes the format and essential
content to be used by a Faculty Member in preparing the teaching dossier for
evaluation of Teaching Effectiveness (Collective Agreement, 2015-2019).
Evaluation of Teaching Performance
19.6 Teaching performance requires the evaluation of all of a Faculty Member’s
methods and forms of teaching and student supervision that are described
and evaluated in accordance with the evaluation policy of the Faculty and of
the Department in which the Faculty Member holds an appointment.
Teaching performance includes contributions to the Department’s or
Faculty’s teaching program and to scholarship related to teaching as
described in the evaluation policy of each Faculty and in any relevant
departmental policies. Scholarship related to teaching includes, but is not
limited to, the following:
19.6.1 scholarly works relating to teaching, curriculum development or
learning in a discipline in which such works would not normally
form part of the Member’s scholarly and professional achievement;
19.6.2 presentations and addresses related to teaching, curriculum
development or learning in a discipline in which such activities
would not normally form part of the Member’s scholarly and
professional achievement; and
19.6.3 contributions related to the unit’s teaching program in the form of
curriculum development, course design or other contributions that
advance the Unit’s ability to meet its teaching responsibilities.
19.7 The evaluation of teaching performance will be conducted on the basis of a
Faculty Member’s teaching dossier that, in addition to course experience
surveys, may include such items as peer reviews, class visit reports, reviews
of syllabi and examinations, evidence of innovative teaching, evidence of
contribution to the Department’s or Faculty’s teaching program, teaching
awards, and scholarship related to teaching. There must be no obligation to
include anecdotal or subjective student comments. Evaluation of teaching
performance must not be based solely on student evaluation scores and must
consider all materials in the teaching dossier.
We suggest that you use your Faculty’s Evaluation Policy in conjunction with this
general resource. If these two documents should differ on any point, please be guided
by the Evaluation Policy of the Faculty in which you hold your appointment. Refer
to your Faculty Evaluation Policy for the maximum length of your dossier.
A typical teaching dossier will have five main sections:
1. Summary of Teaching Responsibilities
2. Approach to Teaching
3. Efforts to Improve Teaching
4. Contributions to Improvement of Teaching and Student Learning
5. Assessment of Teaching
In each of these sections, we propose the following for inclusion. This is only a list of
examples and is not exhaustive or prescriptive.
1. Summary of Teaching Responsibilities
o Courses taught - indicate student numbers, number of TAs and their
roles
o Supervision of graduate students and honours students
o Membership on graduate student or honours student supervisory
committees
o Directed studies
o Student advising
o Involvement in cooperative education work-terms & assessment
of work-term reports
o Supervision of teaching or research practica
o Supervision of artistic projects and performance
2. Approach to Teaching
o Teaching statement or philosophy of teaching
o Goals for teaching in the next academic year
3. Efforts to improve your teaching
o Courses/workshops/seminars/lectures taken at the Learning and
Teaching Centre or elsewhere
o Educational Technology workshops taken from Learning Systems or
elsewhere
o Attendance at learning and teaching events external
to UVic
o Documented changes in response to professional
development
o Consultations with peers
o Consultations with Learning and Teaching Centre personnel
o Documented changes in response to consultations
o Documented changes to courses in response to student ratings of
instruction
4. Contributions to Teaching and Student Learning
o Program and course design or redesign
o Development of teaching resources including links to web-based
material
o Implementation of innovative teaching practices
o Use of innovative assessment practices
o Teaching activities that have contributed to awards,
employment and post graduate opportunities for students
o Activities to support excellence in teaching in your academic unit or
faculty
o Involvement in committees to improve or support student
learning including curriculum committees
o Research on teaching and learning and publications documenting
this research
o Mentoring of other faculty members
o Presentations given at the Learning and Teaching Centre or
elsewhere
o Nomination for, or recipient of, a teaching award
o Learning and Teaching Development Grant recipient
5. Assessment of Teaching
o Course Experience Surveys
o Student ratings of teaching
o Peer evaluations
o Self-evaluation
o Review of syllabi and examinations
o Evidence of innovative teaching
o Other solicited and unsolicited feedback
HOW SHOULD I PROCEED?
Preparing the teaching dossier is a four-part process.
1. Read and discuss with your Chair or peers the following policy documents.
These documents will help you to determine the expectations and priorities of
your academic unit and the university concerning teaching.
Your Faculty Evaluation Policy
Your academic unit Mission Statement
The University Strategic Plan
• University of Victoria Learning Outcomes as approved by Senate,
May, 2, 2014
2. Document teaching contributions and collect evidence.
• Start to collect relevant material from the onset of every teaching
assignment.
Date and annotate all materials to keep track of their source.
• Rather than trying to decide what to keep or discard, at this
point, you should keep anything that might be useful and, if
necessary, ask for permission from the originators to use the
material (e.g. a student paper, a letter of support, etc.).
• Keep a copy of all teaching related documents including course
outlines, assignments, examinations, etc.
3. Develop or update your teaching statement and annual teaching goals.
• The teaching statement is usually discipline-related and explicates
your beliefs and values about the processes of learning,
teaching, and assessment. (Please see the Learning and Teaching
website for resources to guide you in the development of your
teaching philosophy).
• The teaching statement will provide a context so that the reader
will understand your rationale for the structure of your course,
your teaching methods, the forms of evaluation, etc.
• Teaching goals are usually determined at the beginning of an
academic year and can be specific to a course or courses.
• Teaching goals are specific outcomes consistent with your
teaching statement. For example, you may state that you regard
learning as a collaborative activity and therefore one of your
teaching goals could be to include group projects in a particular
course that in the past has required students to complete
assignments on their own.
4. Summarize and present your teaching activities, contributions, and teaching
assessment, and organize the evidence.
Succinctly summarize information wherever feasible, but retain
original documents for reference.
The actual evidence for your teaching accomplishments can be
organized, indexed and kept in the appendices section of your
cumulative Teaching Dossier binder. This evidence is not submitted
with the dossier but is available upon request.
Include reference to your best work, your students' best work, or the
innovations that have had the greatest demonstrable impact on student
learning.
Ensure that any documentation you include is consistent with
your teaching statement.
To show either an improvement in teaching or consistency in
performance, you may wish t o use bar charts to illustrate student
ratings of instruction over the three-year period.
In accordance with the Collective Agreement, 2015-2019:
Student Evaluations of Teaching Performance
19.22 Evidence of teaching performance will include complete
aggregated statistical results of all course experience surveys
administered during the period of review, in accordance with
the evaluation policy of the Faculty in which the Faculty
Member holds an appointment, or the Faculty in which the
course is offered, and any relevant Department policies;
however, anecdotal or subjective student comments will be
included only if the Faculty Member chooses to include
them.
19.23 In addition to the data specified in section 19.22, evidence of
teaching performance may include complete aggregated
statistical results of all teaching evaluation questionnaires
administered by the Faculty Member in a course during the
period of review; however, the Faculty Member is not
obliged to submit or include anecdotal or subjective student
comments.
19.24 A Faculty Member may choose to include anecdotal or
subjective comments by students or former students in her or
his teaching dossier. Where such comments are included that
have been collected as part of a survey of students in a
course, all the comments from that course must be included
in the Faculty Member’s teaching dossier.
When using student comments or letters from students or colleagues,
remember that while persons' opinions expressed about your teaching
are your personal information, you should protect the privacy of the
author by submitting the comment anonymously, in the case of
course evaluations, or only with the consent of the signatory, in the
case of letters. For further details on this issue, please refer to the
Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act guidelines or
contact the University Secretary at Local 8100.
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The Learning and Teaching Centre has consulted the following publications and we wish to acknowledge the
contribution of these works to the development of this guide:
Day, Rene, Robbernecht, Paul, and Roed, Bente (1996) Teaching Dossier: A Guide. University Teaching Services,
University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta.
Judson, Barbara. (2000) The Teaching Dossier Kit. UVic Learning and Teaching Centre.
O'Neil, C., & Wright, A. (1998). Recording teaching accomplishment: A Dalhousie guide to the teaching dossier. Halifax,
NS: Office of Instructional Development and Technology, Dalhousie University.
Shore, Bruce et al. (1992) The CAUT Guide to the Teaching Dossier: Its Preparation and Use. University of Guelph
Teaching Support Services. The Teaching Dossier.
Personnel in the Learning and Teaching Centre are available for individual
consultation on the preparation of your teaching dossier.
Please telephone us at Local 8571 or email us at [email protected]
University of Victoria Learning Outcomes as approved by Senate,
May, 2, 2014
Society requires that people with diverse backgrounds come together and work toward
resolving complex environmental, ethical, scientific and social problems. In addition to
substantive content knowledge in students’ specific fields of study, all students at the
University of Victoria are encouraged to take advantage of opportunities they will be given
to achieve the following learning outcomes.
Intellectual, academic and practical skills in:
Inquiry, analysis, and problem solving
Critical, innovative, and creative thinking
Effective written, visual, and oral communication
Numerical literacy
Critical evaluation of qualitative and quantitative information
Critical management of information, including in digital environments
Collaboration and the ability to work in teams
Personal and social responsibility capacities:
Informed civic engagement and understanding – from local to global
Intercultural knowledge and sensitivity
Ethical and professional reasoning and action
Life-long learning
These outcomes are achieved through:
Academic and co-curricular programs of the highest quality
Integration of research and teaching across the curriculum
Practice and support of relevant skills through progressively more challenging
problems, assignments, projects, and standards for performance
Opportunities for research, experiential, and work-integrated learning
Active engagement with diverse communities, societal issues and meaningful
intellectual challenges
Faculties, units and programs will interpret these outcomes in ways that are discipline-
specific, using the university-wide learning outcomes as guide posts for developing
program-specific and course-specific learning outcomes. Students in different programs
will therefore achieve these outcomes in different ways according to the appropriate
standards of their respective fields of study.
Seven Principles of Good Practice in Undergraduate Education
.
Good Practice:
1. Encourages Contact Between Students and Faculty
Frequent student-faculty contact in and out of classes is the most important factor in
student motivation, and retention. Knowing a few faculty members well enhances
students' intellectual commitment and encourages them to think about their own
values and future plans.
2. Fosters Cooperation Among Students
Good learning, like good work, is collaborative and social, not competitive and
isolated. Working with others often increases involvement in learning. Sharing
one's own ideas and responding to others' reactions sharpens thinking and deepens
understanding.
3. Encourages Active Learning
Learning is not a spectator sport. Students must talk about what they are learning,
write about it, relate it to past experiences and apply it to their daily lives. They
must make what they learn part of themselves.
4. Gives Prompt Feedback
Students need appropriate feedback on performance to benefit from courses. When
getting started, students need help in assessing existing knowledge and
competence. In classes, students need frequent opportunities to perform and receive
suggestions for improvement.
5. Emphasizes Time on Task
Time plus energy equals learning. There is no substitute for time on task. Learning to
use one's time well is critical for students and professionals alike.
6. Communicates High Expectations
Expecting students to perform well becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy particularly
when teachers and institutions hold high expectations for themselves and make
extra efforts.
7. Respects Diverse Talents and Ways of Learning
There are many roads to learning. People bring different talents and styles of
learning to university. Students need the opportunity to show their talents and learn
in ways that work for them. Then they can be pushed to learn in new ways that do
not come so easily.
Chickering, A. and Z. Gamson (1991). Seven Principles for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education, Jossey-Bass.
