Student Appraisal of Teaching (SAT) Procedure
- Approver:
- Academic Coordinating Committee
- Policy Owner:
- Vice-President, Academic
- Policy Lead(s):
- Director, Institutional Research and Planning
- Defining policy:
- Effective date:
- 2019-03-04
- Date of last approval:
- 2019-03-04
- Status:
- Under review
Procedure Statement
As an institution of teaching and learning, Conestoga recognizes the benefits of
providing faculty with student feedback on teaching. At regular periods during the academic
year, Student Appraisals of Teaching (SAT) are administered in courses taught by faculty.
Definitions
Conestoga College maintains a glossary of terms specific to the institution. The ones in use for this document are defined below.
- Full-SAT
- The Full-SAT was developed in 2014 as part of a multi-college Ministry-funded project. There are 42 standard questions as well as an open-ended comment box.
- Quick-SAT
- The Quick-SAT was developed in 2017 as a mechanism for faculty to receive early feedback from students. There are five questions on the Quick-SAT as well as an open-ended comment box.
- Student Appraisal of Teaching (SAT)
- Internal online and/or paper college survey completed by all students associated with a faculty/course combination that has been selected for a SAT by the program Chair. SATs occur in the last quarter of a course -typically during the months of November, March and July. SAT is a survey process used for obtaining feedback from students to enhance the performance of teaching at Conestoga.
Responsibilities
Human Resources
- Identify which full-time faculty are due for a Full-SAT in order to support the performance appraisal process.
- Notify administrative assistants of full-time faculty scheduled for Full-SATs.
- Update HR records to identify for whom Full-SATs have been completed.
School Administrative Assistants
- Work with the chair to:
- Confirm list of full-time faculty scheduled for Full-SATs.
- Identify any part-time or additional full-time faculty who will be given a Full-SAT.
- Identify any faculty to be scheduled for a Quick-SAT.
- Select courses for each faculty Full-SAT/Quick-SAT and identify the selection in the Student Information System (SIS).
- For in-class courses in full-time programs:
- Schedule and notify faculty of the in-class Full-SAT administration date.
- Send Institutional Research and Planning the finalized list of Full-SAT faculty/course selections.
- Administer in-class Full-SATs.
- Submit any paper completions to Institutional Research and Planning.
- Communicate with Institutional Research and Planning about changes, challenges or anomalies in administering SATs.
Chairs
- Ensure that:
- New faculty are identified for a Quick-SAT.
- The Full-SAT schedule for full-time faculty is confirmed.
- Additional part-time or full-time faculty who will be given a Full-SAT or Quick-SAT are identified.
- Courses for each faculty Full-SAT or Quick-SAT are selected.
- Encourage faculty to promote SAT participation to their students.
- Share and review SAT reports with faculty.
Institutional Research and Planning
- Consolidate received Full-SAT selections of faculty and courses identified by chairs.
- Program the online survey management system to gather survey results for faculty selected for Full-SATs and Quick-SATs.
- Program the online survey management system to automatically produce and distribute Quick-SAT reports to faculty and Chairs.
- Produce Full-SAT reports and ensure that they are available to chairs within two weeks of the start of the next semester.
- Provide Human Resources with the final list of faculty for whom Full-SATs have been completed.
- Store and provide faculty and chairs with access to their SAT reports, as requested.
Faculty
- Contact school administrative assistants about any scheduling conflicts or changes.
- Communicate with students about upcoming SATs and encouraging them to participate.
Procedure
- In the first week of the semester, Human Resources identifies which full-time faculty are due for a Full-SAT and notifies school administrative assistants.
- School administrative assistants and chairs:
- Confirm list of full-time faculty scheduled for Full-SATs.
- Confirm list of new faculty scheduled for Quick-SATs
- Identify any additional part-time or full-time faculty who will be given a Full-SAT or Quick-SAT.
- Select courses for each faculty.
- Schedule in-class Full-SAT and notify faculty.
- Send consolidated list of selected faculty, courses and tentative in-class dates to Institutional Research and Planning.
- Confirm importance of SAT process.
- Encourage faculty to promote participation to students.
- Institutional Research and Planning:
- Conduct necessary steps to prepare and deploy the college’s online survey management system.
- The Quick-SAT is administered entirely online once about one-quarter of the semester has been delivered, i.e., the survey window is between 25% and 35% of the course duration. Automated reports are generated and made available to faculty and chairs within one week of the survey close date.
- The Full-SAT is administered once a minimum of two-thirds of the semester has been delivered, i.e. the survey window is between 67% and 90% of the course duration. During this window, school administrative assistants/designates in full-time programs administer in-class Full-SATs and complete a SAT Recording sheet. All hard copies of Full-SATs and the SAT Recording sheet are sent via interoffice mail to Institutional Research and Planning. In part-time programs and for online courses, in-class administration and the use of paper Full-SATs is optional.
- Institutional Research and Planning generates Full-SAT reports and distributes to chairs within two weeks of the start of the next semester.
- Chairs share and review reports with faculty.
- Human Resources updates HR records to identify full-time faculty who have had Full-SATs completed
Revision Log
Date | Details |
| 2018-03-01 | Original |
| 2019-03-04 | Academic Forum |
| 2019-03-20 | Academic Coordinating Committee |