Academic Recognition Task Force Survey – Chairs of Academic Units

Response Rate

	Distributed Surveys		Accessed Web Page		Responded

	~ 200					  90			35 (39%)

	Each of the nearly 200 individuals (identified at http://www.uh.edu/~jbutler/anon/artf.html)  received an e-mail message with a a brief description of the Digital Library for Earth and the URL of the survey.  Although some individuals may have accessed the survey web page more than once, it seems reasonable to judge response as the percentage of those who actually looked at the survey and returned their responses – 39%.

The Respondents

	Gender
		Male				28		82%
		Female	  		  3		  9%
		No Response			  3		  9%

	Rank	
		Professor			26		76%
		Associate Professor		  7		21%
		No Response			  1		   4%
	
	Institution
		Undergraduate		  8		24%
		Masters			  5		15%
		Doctoral			21		61%

	Institution Type
		Private			  6		17%
		Public				22		65%
		No Response			  6		17%

At My Institution

(1)	At my institution individuals can select between a Research Track or a Teaching Track. Each track has its own weighting scheme for expectations in teaching, research and service.

	No					24		71%
	Yes					  4		12%
	Not Applicable			  6		17%

(2)	At my institution the following relative weights for research, teaching and service are used:

	Research

		> 50%			  8		24%
		    50%			14		41%
		    33%		  	11		32%
		    No Response	  1	  	  3%

	Teaching
		
		> 50%			  4		12%
		   50%			18		53%
		   33%			11		32%
		   Not Applicable	  1		  3%

	Service

		About 10%		19		56%
		About 25%		10		29%
		About 33%		  0		   
		Not Applicable	  5		15%

(3)	Non-tenured faculty colleagues are encouraged to spend time preparing Internet and other multimedia resources for their
          	courses.

		Agree			18		53%
		Disagree		12		35%
		Strongly Disagree	  3		  9%
		No Response		  1		  3% 

(4)	The primary source of information used in evaluating teaching at my institution are student surveys conducted at or near the
            end of the course.

		Strongly Agree	10		29%
		Agree			19		56%
		Disagree		  5		15%
		
(5)	All our mandatory review processes of faculty performance require that each faculty member submit a "teaching portfolio"
            that includes representative samples of materials developed and methods used in developing and conducting classes.
		Strongly Agree	  3		  9%
		Agree			13		38%
		Disagree		12		35%
		Strongly Disagree	  6		18%
		
(6)	The efforts of my faculty colleagues to enhance learning are fairly taken into consideration in our review processes.

		Strongly Agree	  8		24%
		Agree			22		65%
		Disagree		  2		  6%
		Strongly Disagree	  2		  6%	

(7)	With respect to the production of Internet and multimedia resources, what is the single biggest obstacle your faculty face on
          	your campus?
	
		Failure of Colleagures to Support		  3	  9%
		Failure of Administration to Support	  1	  3%
		Lack of Student Interest			  1	  3%
		Lack of Campus Infrastructure		  3	  9%
		Lack of Personal Skills			  2	  6%
		Time to Prepare Such Resources		23	68%

(8)	With respect to the production of Internet and multimedia resources, what is the single biggest obstacle your faculty face on
          	your campus?
	
		Failure of Colleagures to Support		  3	  9%
		Failure of Administration to Support	  2	  6%
		Lack of Student Interest			  1	  3%
		Lack of Campus Infrastructure		  3	  9%
		Lack of Personal Skills			14	41%
		Time to Prepare Such Resources		  8	23%
		None Selected				  3	  9%

The Digital Library for Earth System Education

(1)	There is a need for "peer review" of Internet resources much as there is a "peer review" process for "formal" publications.

		Strongly Agree		  9		26%
		Agree				18		53%
		Disagree			  5		15%
		Strongly Disagree		  1		  3%	  		  
		None Selected		  1		  3%

The following criteria will be an integral part of the process of evaluation 
of the DLESE collection:

                 i.	Accuracy (as evaluated by scientists) 
    ii.	Importance/Significance (of the resource as you would use it) 
iii.	Pedagogical Effectiveness. (Is there evidence that student learning has occurred?) 
iv.	Well Documented. (Data shall have metadata, lessons shall have rubrics, etc.) 
               v.	Ease of Use (for Both students and faculty) 
               vi.	Inspirational or Motivational or Fun (for the student) 
              vii.	Robustness/Sustainability (of the resource)

(2)	Which single criterion would have the greatest impact on you as a chair of a faculty member who produced a resource
         	selected for the DLESE collection?

	Pedagogical Effectiveness		12		35%
	Accuracy				11		32%
	Importance				  7		21%
	Ease of Use				  3		  9%
(3)	Which single criterion would have the second greatest impact  on you as a chair of a faculty member who produced a resource
         	selected for the DLESE collection?

	Pedagogical Effectiveness		10		29%
	Robustness				  7		21%
	Accuracy				  5		15%
	Importance				  5		15%
	Well Documented			  2		  6%

(4)	I would encourage my faculty who have developed superior learning resources to consider putting them in an electronic form
          	and submitting them for DLESE review.

	Strongly Agree			  5		15%
	Agree					22		65%
	Disagree				  4		12%
	Strongly Disagree			  3		  9%

Summary

	Approximately 80% of the respondents are male and 76% are professors.  Doctoral granting institutions are represented by about 60% of the respondents.

Less than 15% are employed at a college that allows individuals to select from a Research or a Teaching track.  The average chair member works for an institution in which research counts for about than 50%, teaching for about 35% and service about 15% of their expected workload.  More than 85% report than end of the term student evaluations are the primary source of input for the evaluation of their teaching and about 50% have the opportunity to submit a teaching portfolio.

About half of the chairs agree that they encourage their non-tenured colleagues to develop e-resources for their courses and 88% agree that their colleagues are fairly evaluated with respect to their teaching efforts.

	Nearly 90% reported that the lack of time was the first (68%) or second (22%) biggest obstacle to their efforts in creating resources.  The other potential responses received low selection.  40% listed lack of skills as the second biggest obstacle.  80% agree that there is a need for peer review.

	Pedagogical Effectiveness and Accuracy received about 67% of the responses for the criteria with the greatest impact on chairs.  65% of the respondents listed Pedagogical Effectiveness as the first or second responses with the greatest impact.  Ease of Use was the third highest.  The remainder of the responses receive scant mention.

	80% agreed that the would encourage faculty who produced superior resources to submit them to DLESE for review.

Comments From Chairs

Y.	I'm not sure how to protect their intellectual contribution.  However, 
would suggest that various listservs could be used to communicate as well as presentations by the coodinators of the DLESE site(s) at professional meetings.  Finally, periodic articles in JGE, Comp. in Geosci.,  Geotimes and perhaps EOS would be appropriate ways to communicate expansion of the DLESE.	

Z.	I'm not sure how to protect their intellectual contribution.  However, I
 would suggest that various listservs could be used to communicate as well as presentations by the coodinators of the DLESE site(s) at professional meetings.  Finally, periodic articles in JGE, Comp. in Geosci.,  Geotimes and perhaps EOS would be appropriate ways to communicate expansion of the DLESE.	

C.	Protection of intellectual contributions very quickly becomes a legal issue.  Other than traditional copyright, I know of no true safeguard.  We use PDF documents in many instances so that alteration of the originals is more difficult, but it is still possible.  Communication of efforts in this area is best communicated digitally via the web.  Innovation into a locale always needs a trail-blazing faculty member who can then show their colleagues new options.  The trailblazers are already there; they just need more quality examples to show without having to build them themselves.

D.	Communicate efforts: If materials are peer reviewed, Departments can have the option of treating contribution as publications and reward facutly that way. Best way is to encrypt material and require passwords for use. A fee structure should be established to pay royalties and support upkeep.
You know that many Universities (like the University of Texas System) are getting into internet instruction big time. Faculty here will be putting efforts into the UT System internet courses and may not have time to participate in DLESE unless there is a way to have materials on both the University system and DLESE.	

E.	First, all work should be clearly attributed to the person who created it.  If done in a uniform manner people will be more willing to share.

Second, if there is a review process, faculty can finally gain recognition for what they put on the web.  Right now you can spend an awful lot of time developing things for the web but they gain little recognition at promotion and tenure time because no third part review is done.

Third, if there are occasional 'awards' or 'contribution acknowledgements', then faculty members might strive to produce and share their best to reach for those 

F.	By far the biggest obstacle for our faculty regarding web-based instruction is our own awareness of the limitations of such a venue for teaching. It is NOT cost- or time- effective and only serves the extremely motivated student. We really feel that web-based instruction merely improves upon correspondence courses but should serve no larger an audience nor should a web-based degree reap any more authenticity than a correspondence course.	

G.	My preferred model for educational resources would be some sort of freeware that is multi-authored and Linux-like in that the best content is preserved/maintained.  An expert system that is revised quarterly by participating experts.  There should be mechanisms for alternate viewpoints on matters that are not settled. Similarly, there should be alternate ways of presenting the same agreed upon facts/theory because not all students learn the same way.	

H.	It should presumably be the responsibility of the faculty member to report their activity with the DLESE to their department.  The department here is making inroads to adapt technology in the classroom and in the field and seem to be reasonably placed to move forward with this.	

I.	I have as a division chair attempted to reward persons for that which they do, and not penalize someone for not contributing in ways that necessarily mimic others, or be punitive for someone "not doing something" that someone else might have done.  The important criteria, I believe, have been included for evaluating.  Effectiveness seems to be the elusive criterion which is most difficult to assess.	

J.	I am really unsure what you are asking for with this question. Each campus and instructor's utilization of internet and other on-line resources will vary.  The criteria proposed should be generally appicable.  The two major issues that I can think of right now are:

1. performance and recognition of these efforts as a  scholary activity.

2. how to communicate a "successful trial" to peers so that they can build upon this success.	

K.	I just completed your survey.  It was a little unclear from the form, but
I would like to receive the results of your survey/study.  It is of
interest because of the exploding impact this type of activity has on us
all.