Tools and Resources

Drawing upon data from surveys of students and instructors at the 19 Commonwealth Campuses during 2012, this report addresses the following research questions:

• What are the instructional elements that Commonwealth Campus students and teachers view as important for quality teaching?
• How frequently are these elements realized in the teaching that actually occurs?
• How favorably do Commonwealth Campus students rate the overall quality of the instruction they receive?
• What factors relate to differences in how students' perceive instructional quality?
• Do the perceptions of undergraduate students at the Commonwealth Campuses concerning the quality of instruction differ from those at University Park?
• How, if at all, have the perceptions concerning instructional quality changed across time?

Report of results from a 2012 survey of student and faculty perceptions of the quality of instruction at Penn State’s Commonwealth Campuses. This study focuses on what Commonwealth Campus students and faculty believe are the most important elements of quality instruction, their frequency at the campuses, students' ratings of their instruction, factors that differentiate how students perceive quality, comparison of results from Commonwealth Campuses and University Park, and whether perceptions have changed over time.

Report of results from a 2011 survey of student and faculty perceptions of the quality of instruction at Penn State’s University Park campus. This study focuses on what students and faculty believe are the most important elements of quality instruction, their frequency at University Park, students' ratings of their instruction, factors that influence students' ratings, and changes in perceptions compared to 1996 survey results.

Report of results from a 2012 survey of student and faculty perceptions of the quality of instruction of courses offered through Penn State’s World Campus. This study focuses on what students and faculty believe are the most important elements of quality instruction, their frequency in World Campus courses, students' ratings of their instruction, factors that influence students' ratings, and comparison of results from World Campus, the Commonwealth Campuses, and University Park.

Drawing upon new data obtained from surveys of students and instructors at the University Park Campus of Penn State carried out in 2011, this report addresses the following research questions:

• What are the elements that students and instructors believe are most important to achieving quality teaching?
• How frequently do these occur in University Park classrooms today?
• How do University Park students rate the quality of the instruction they receive?
• What factors influence students’ ratings of teaching quality in a course?
• How have the perceptions of students and instructors changed since the 1996 survey?

Fern K. Willits and Mark A. Brennan 2016 Changing Perceptions of the University as a Community of Learning: The Case of Penn State. International Journal of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, 28(1), 66-74.
Supported by a grant from the Schreyer Institute for Teaching Excellence

This activity involves students pairing up to answer questions about course content and can be used for review of material before a test, for example, or for practice.

This Classroom Assessment Technique (CAT) was developed by Stephen Brookfield, author of Becoming A Critically Reflective Teacher (San Francisco: Jossey Bass 1995). He refers to it as a “Critical Incident Questionnaire," but the questions can also be provided to students in advance to students as a way to jump-start conversations during office hours (remote & in-person).