Teaching Portfolios: Different places, different uses

A symposium on "Teaching portfolios in judging teacher/teaching quality" during the ICED 2002 conference provided insights into the uses of teaching portfolios in Australia, the Netherlands, Sri Lanka, the UK and the USA. The panel members discussed specific ways in which teaching portfolios are used, and parts of the discussion are outlined below.

Most Australian universities (at least 35 institutions) require teaching evidence in the academic promotion applications that are under the 'teaching and research' category. The evidence may or may not be referred to as a 'teaching portfolio', but the specified content is typical of a portfolio. The portfolio is expected to show evidence of teaching achievement, performance, contribution, scholarship and/or experience among other things. The weighting allocated to such teaching evidence in a promotion application varies not only for academic levels within an institution but also for a particular level across institutions. While one university asks applicants to indicate the weighting preference within a given range, another specifies the weighting for each level. Should there be a more common understanding of what constitutes good teaching and the role of teaching evidence in academic promotion?

While the use of teaching portfolios or dossiers in summative decision making has increased in the past few decades, there is still a heavy reliance on student evaluations of teaching in the US universities and colleges. The move towards using portfolios was in part to overcome some of the problems associated with using student evaluations of teaching in the academic promotion or tenure procedure. The growth in portfolio use necessitated other developments, such as provision of help in the preparation of portfolios. In an effort to make the preparation and assessment of portfolios easier, some universities have limited the portfolio size and stipulated the content headings. One university is reported to have a hundred-page document on "Dossier Guidelines". Apart from instructions for portfolio preparation that leave little room for reflective practice and diversity, there is also a trend towards competition rather than collaboration among academics in relation to evaluation of teaching portfolios.

Of about 100 higher education institutions in the UK, a significant majority has some form of 'teacher training' for staff, and accreditation for the training programme can be obtained from the Staff and Educational Development Association (SEDA) or the Institute for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education (ILT). SEDA and ILT assessments of individuals are based on portfolios. The portfolios are expected to contain a variety of information, such as course outlines and plans, teaching materials, assessment assignments and criteria, administration documents, notes from teaching observation and student feedback. In addition to such evidence, portfolios should have reflective narrative. A vexing question in the assessment of portfolios is how to recognise and value diversity and yet retain standards.

The University of Colombo in Sri Lanka has a SEDA accredited programme for academic staff development. Responsibility for teaching portfolio development in the programme undergoes a progressive transfer from the programme co-ordinator to the participant i.e. after initial guidance, the programme participants become empowered to develop their portfolios. An unexpected outcome of this initiative was that a Buddhist monk applied the portfolio approach learnt in the programme to write a book on Buddhist teachings.

In the Netherlands, use of portfolios appears to be more common in the assessment of student learning outcomes than the assessment of teaching. Professional courses in particular are likely to adopt portfolio assessment. A ten-year success story of using portfolios in a teacher education course indicates the potential for portfolio use in staff development programmes. Currently, UWA requires a teaching portfolio as part of an application for promotion to professorial level, and strongly recommends its inclusion for a sub-professorial level if the applicant wishes to emphasise her/his teaching.

Should institutions require comprehensive evidence of teaching or a selection of 'best' evidence?