The impact of an academic program review on faculty: A mid-process assessment

• Main Author: Jerome, Mary Reinbold
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses 01-01-1991
• Subjects: Educational administration; Higher education; School administration; Teacher education
• ISBN: 9798759954408

As academic program reviews have become the norm in evaluating both institutions of higher education and programs within these institutions, there is a critical need to know the elements that make a program review successful. One central component of most academic program reviews today, whether initiated by the institution itself or an external agency, is self-study. If a self-study is to be meaningful for the participants and productive for the academic program being studied, it is important to ask what factors in the preparation and process of the review are critical to making the review successful. Such an inquiry is the subject of this dissertation. Through the use of a detailed questionnaire and in-depth interviews, data have been collected from a group of university faculty members in an English as a Second Language program of a large private research university on attitudes and opinions on the value of a self-study in progress. On the basis of these data, factors which contributed to the overall perception of success or failure were explored. The results gleaned from analysis of the questionnaire and interviews demonstrate that this faculty viewed their self-study process as successful. The data show the self-study provided insight into the strengths and weaknesses of their program, gave the faculty a dynamic instrument for program change and personal faculty development, and fostered continual learning opportunities in a wide variety of areas for the faculty. It is believed that these positive findings were a direct result of the faculty owning the direction and implementation of the entire self-study process. Sufficient resources, especially in the form of released time were granted to the self-study faculty, and changes were made in the department as they were perceived necessary over the course of the self-study. It is clear that self-study should be a central component of academic program review. Self-study controlled by the faculty can be a powerful instrument to foster change, increase collegiality, develop professionalism, and continue the learning process for faculty. Such positive results could impact forcefully on teaching and learning in universities throughout the country.