ARTICLE 19, EVALUATION
The excellence of the institution depends on the quality of its faculty members. Faculty evaluation is a method of addressing the performance of faculty. When performed conscientiously, evaluation can enhance faculty performance and promote excellence by providing positive reinforcement, constructive advice, and specific recommendations for improvement. Evaluation provides an opportunity for professional growth, recognition and improvement.
General Provisions
A. Formal evaluations have several purposes. They include:
1. Recognizing outstanding performance;
2. Improving satisfactory performance and furthering the growth of faculty members who are performing well;
3. Identifying weak performance and assisting faculty members in achieving required improvement; and
4. Documenting unsatisfactory performance. Formal evaluations review a faculty member's performance of his or her scheduled duties as well as all of his or her other contractual and professional obligations.
B. Formal evaluations shall be conducted and documented as prescribed in this article. They shall occur at intervals that are at least as frequent as those prescribed in Sections D, H, J, K and O and can take the form of a basic evaluation, a comprehensive evaluation, an administrative evaluation, or a specialized evaluation (for example, a Department Chair evaluation).
1. A basic evaluation is an evaluation that reviews a faculty member's performance with little, if any, structured data gathering, and without the establishment of a peer review committee.
2. A comprehensive evaluation is an evaluation that reviews a faculty member's performance based on information derived from considerable structured data gathering under the supervision of a peer review committee.
3. An administrative evaluation is a review of a faculty member's performance conducted by an appropriate Vice President or his or her designee.
C. As used in this article, the terms tenured or regular faculty, probationary or contract faculty, and temporary faculty shall be defined as follows:
1. Tenured or regular faculty are those faculty members who have completed their probationary period and obtained permanent status.
2. Probationary or contract faculty are those faculty members who are employed under an annual contract in a probationary assignment, but who have not completed their probationary period.
3. Temporary faculty are those faculty members who are neither tenured nor probationary, and who are employed under a provisions of the Education Code that authorize their service as temporary employees. They may be either adjunct faculty (generally employed under Article 16) or temporary "monthly-rate" faculty.
Evaluation of Tenured Faculty
D. Tenured faculty members shall be evaluated every three academic years. Disregarding those instances in which an administrative evaluation or specialized evaluation is appropriate, the form of the evaluation shall alternate between a basic evaluation and a comprehensive evaluation, unless:
1. The faculty member elects to receive a comprehensive evaluation; or
2. The faculty member's Department Chair, with the concurrence of the Vice President or his or her designee, calls for a comprehensive evaluation.
E. To initiate a formal evaluation, the appropriate Vice President or his or her designee shall send the tenured faculty member, and his or her Department Chair, a notice informing them that the faculty member will be evaluated as provided in this article and, if a comprehensive evaluation is not already required by Section D, describing how the form of the evaluation will be determined.
F. Basic evaluations shall be conducted as follows:
1. The evaluation shall be recorded on the appropriate basic evaluation form (see Appendix C) completed by the faculty member's Department Chair, or a tenured faculty member designated by the Department Chair in consultation with the Vice President or his or her designee. Once completed, the evaluation shall be given to the faculty member and a copy shall be placed in the faculty member's personnel file.
2. When the completed evaluation is given to the faculty member, it shall be accompanied by written advice that the faculty member has the right to submit a written comment regarding the evaluation. If the faculty member chooses to submit a comment, it shall be appended to the copy of the evaluation contained in the faculty member's personnel file.
3. In assessing the tenured faculty member's performance, the individual responsible for completing the evaluation shall not be required to conduct any structured data gathering. Instead, he or she shall rely on available information, but only to the extent that it is relevant and obtained from appropriate sources (for example, information derived from: personal observation or experience with the tenured faculty member; the tenured faculty member's peers or other co-workers; student evaluations, if any; self-evaluative material prepared by the tenured faculty member himself or herself; or prior evaluations). Nevertheless, by mutual agreement between the tenured faculty member and the individual responsible for completing the evaluation, the parties may specify that the evaluation shall include structured data gathering from peers or other co-workers, students, or other relevant sources to the extent they determine such data gathering will be useful and appropriate.
4. In addition to indicating ratings of the tenured faculty member's performance, the individual responsible for completing the evaluation may recommend that the tenured faculty member engage in appropriate personal growth or professional development activities.
5. If a tenured faculty member's overall performance on his or her basic evaluation is rated "needs to improve" or "unsatisfactory," the faculty member shall be informed in writing that he or she has the right to a comprehensive evaluation and asked if he or she wants one.
6. Following a basic evaluation, a tenured faculty member may request, and if requested, shall receive a comprehensive evaluation, which shall commence no later than the next regular semester.
G. Comprehensive evaluations shall be conducted as follows:
1. The President or his or her designee shall appoint a peer review committee to conduct the evaluation. The committee shall consist of:
a. the appropriate Department Chair or his or her designee;
b. two tenured faculty members, one of whom shall be selected by the faculty member being evaluated, and one of whom shall be chosen by the department; and
c. the appropriate Vice President or his or her designee, who shall be a non-voting member of the committee
The Vice President or Department Chair may name as a designee to serve on the committee anyone who is an academic administrator or tenured faculty member at the college, or - with the approval of the President - anyone who is an academic administrator or tenured faculty member at another community college in California. The faculty member has the option of submitting a timely challenge to the appointment of any one voting member from the peer review committee. To be timely the challenge must be received in writing by the President on or before the date of the peer review committee's first meeting. Whenever a committee member needs to be replaced because of the receipt of a timely challenge, the President shall promptly appoint a replacement by following the appointment process applicable to the replacement member's predecessor.
2. Once appointed, the peer review committee shall elect one of its members to serve as its chairperson. The role of the chairperson shall be to convene meetings of the committee, prepare meeting agendas, preside at committee meetings, and maintain an evaluation file consisting of all of the documents and other materials that are relevant to the evaluation and that need to be preserved as a part of the process.
3. Before commencing any structured data gathering or engaging in any other substantive business, the peer review committee shall prepare a plan for the evaluation that specifies:
a. The materials it intends to request from the faculty member being evaluated (for example: self-evaluation materials; representative course syllabi; sample class assignments, tests, or exercises; selected course handouts; previous student evaluations, if available; or other relevant work products.)
b. The extent to which it intends to collect data from students, peers, administrators or other individuals using the data collection instruments set forth in Appendix C;
c. How it intends to inquire into the nature and extent of the faculty member's response to recommendations contained in any of his or her prior evaluations;
d. Whom it intends to charge with the responsibility of collecting the data, whether a member of the committee or not; and
e. A general schedule under which the committee intends to complete its work.
4. Before adopting a final version of its plan, the committee shall share a draft of the plan with the faculty member being evaluated and solicit his or her comments. Once it adopts a final plan, the committee shall send a copy of the plan to the faculty member being evaluated and the Vice President.
5. At the conclusion of its data gathering, the peer review committee shall review all of the data collected as part of the evaluation plan, as well as any formal recommendations to the faculty member contained in his or her past evaluations. Based on that information, the committee shall complete an appropriate comprehensive evaluation summary using an appropriate summary form (see Appendix C). For each applicable performance category listed on the form, the committee shall:
a. prepare a brief narrative assessment of the faculty member's performance that reflects the committee's analysis of the data it collected; and
b. assign one of the following ratings: exceeds expectations, meets expectations, needs improvement. The committee may also include as a part of the comprehensive evaluation summary any formal recommendations to the faculty member being evaluated it believes are appropriate.
6. As a part of the comprehensive evaluation summary the peer review committee shall also include its recommendation as to whether the faculty member's overall performance should be rated as satisfactory, needs to improve, or unsatisfactory.
7. Formal actions of the peer review committee shall be taken by majority vote of the committee, but if the members of the committee do not agree on the content of the comprehensive evaluation summary, the committee shall provide for dissenting views to be documented and included as a part of the summary.
8. In addition to completing a comprehensive evaluation summary, the peer review committee may also prepare a separate document containing any informal comments or recommendations to the faculty member being evaluated. Any such document shall be treated as a private communication to the faculty member and shall not become part of the evaluation file.
9. The peer review committee shall forward the comprehensive evaluation summary to the faculty member being evaluated for his or her comment. If the faculty member submits comments, the committee shall review them and take any additional action it determines to be appropriate in light of the comments. Thereafter, it shall forward the completed evaluation file (including the evaluation plan, the data collection instruments the committee relied upon in preparing the evaluation, the comprehensive evaluation summary, and any other relevant documents) to the Vice President or his or her designee. If the faculty member declines to comment, or fails to comment within five working days of the date on which the committee sent the summary to the faculty member, the peer review committee shall forward the completed evaluation file (including all of the materials referenced above) to the Vice President or his or her designee.
10. Based solely on the comprehensive evaluation summary and the accompanying materials in the evaluation file the Vice President or his or her designee shall either:
a. complete the evaluation by formally accepting the peer review committee's evaluation summary; or
b. return the evaluation to the peer review committee with a written explanation of the reasons he or she declined to accept the evaluation, and comments regarding proposed steps the committee should take to remedy the problems he or she perceived.
11. If the Vice President or his or her designee declined to accept the evaluation and instead returned it to the peer review committee, the following shall occur:
a. The peer review committee shall review the explanation of the reasons the evaluation was not accepted and consider the proposed steps to remedy the problems the Vice President or his or her designee perceived with the evaluation. If the committee determines that additional actions are necessary to enhance or improve the evaluation in light of the explanation and comments from the Vice President or his or her designee, it shall take those actions. It may also revise, correct, or amend the evaluation summary in any way it determines is appropriate, or leave it unchanged.
b. Once the peer review committee has completed any actions it determined to be necessary to enhance or improve the evaluation and made any revisions, corrections or amendments to the evaluation summary it determined to be appropriate, it shall again forward the evaluation summary (with a written statement of the actions it took, if any) to the faculty member being evaluated for his or her comment. If the faculty member declines to comment, or fails to comment within five working days of the date on which the committee sent the summary to the faculty member, the peer review committee shall forward the evaluation summary to the Vice President or his or her designee.
c. Upon receiving the evaluation summary, the Vice President or his or her designee shall complete the evaluation by formally accepting the peer review committee's evaluation summary.
12. Once the Vice President or his or her designee has completed the evaluation by formally accepting the peer review committee's evaluation summary, he or she shall deliver the evaluation summary to the faculty member and place a copy of it in the faculty member's personnel file.
13. The completed evaluation, when delivered to the faculty member by the Vice President, shall be accompanied by written advice that the faculty member has the right to submit a written comment regarding the evaluation. If the faculty member chooses to submit a comment, it shall be appended to the copy of the evaluation contained in the faculty member's personnel file.
H. The President or his or her designee may initiate an administrative evaluation if:
1. a faculty member's overall performance on his or her comprehensive evaluation is rated "needs to improve" or "unsatisfactory;" or
2. the President cites identifiable issues about the faculty member's performance that are disclosed by the faculty member's basic evaluation, the faculty member declines the opportunity to receive a comprehensive evaluation, and the Department Chair concurs that the issues cited by the President warrant further review and documentation through an administrative evaluation; or
3. the President cites identifiable issues about the faculty member's performance that are disclosed by the faculty member's comprehensive evaluation, and the peer review committee concurs that those issues warrant further review and documentation through an administrative evaluation; or
4. the President determines that an administrative evaluation is appropriate to review events or circumstances that could lead to formal disciplinary action under Education Code Section 87732 (in which case the evaluation, once completed, shall be deemed to have served the purposes specified in Education Code Section 87671). Any administrative evaluation initiated under Subsection 1, 2 or 3 of this section shall be commenced within thirty working days of the completion of the basic or comprehensive evaluation. Furthermore, it shall be concluded within sixty days after it was commenced.
I. Administrative evaluations shall be conducted as follows:
1. If the administrative evaluation follows a basic or comprehensive evaluation, the Vice President or his or her designee shall solicit input from:
a. the individual who completed the evaluation (in the case of a basic evaluation), or the peer review committee (in the case of a comprehensive evaluation);
b. appropriate individuals the faculty member identifies as having relevant information about his or her performance; and
c. any others the Vice President or his or her designee believes should have relevant information about the performance of the faculty member.
All such input shall be considered by the Vice President or his or her designee before he or she completes the administrative evaluation.
2. The Vice President or his or her designee may, if it is appropriate to the evaluation, observe the faculty member as he or she teaches or performs his or her other duties, conduct student evaluations with prior notification to the faculty member as to when such student evaluations would occur, or collect relevant data through other appropriate data collection methods.
3. The administrative evaluation shall be recorded on the appropriate administrative evaluation form (see Appendix C). Once the Vice President or his or her designee has completed the form, he or she shall deliver the evaluation to the faculty member and place a copy of the form in the faculty member's personnel file.
4. The completed administrative evaluation, when delivered to the faculty member by the Vice President, shall be accompanied by written advice that the faculty member has the right to submit a written comment regarding the evaluation. If the faculty member chooses to submit a comment, it shall be appended to the copy of the administrative evaluation contained in the faculty member's personnel file.
Evaluation of Tenured Faculty Serving as Directors, Instructors Special Assignment, Consulting Instructors, College Nurse or in Similar Assignments
J. Tenured faculty members who are serving as Directors, Instructors Special Assignment, Consulting Instructors, College Nurse or in similar assignments shall be evaluated every three years in accordance with this Article generally and Sections D through I in particular provided, however, that if the faculty member is not a member of a department (counselors in EOPS, DSPS, Matriculation, and GAIN/CALWORKS are not external to a department) and reports directly to an administrator, the evaluation shall instead be conducted as specified in Sections D through I with the following modifications:
1. For a basic evaluation, the evaluation shall be recorded on an appropriate Specialized Evaluation Form completed by the faculty member's supervisor; and
2. For a comprehensive evaluation, in place of the peer review committee described in Section G.1, the President or his or her designee shall appoint a committee consisting of:
a. The faculty member's supervisor or his or her designee; and
b. Two tenured faculty members, one of whom shall be selected by the faculty member being evaluated, and one of whom shall be chosen jointly by the Vice President and the AFT Chapter President. Rather than recording the evaluation on a standard comprehensive evaluation form, the committee shall record the evaluation on an appropriate Specialized Evaluation Form.
Evaluation of Department Chairs
K. During a faculty member's service as a Department Chair, his or her performance of the Department Chair's duties and responsibilities shall be evaluated at the end of his or her first year of service as Department Chair and at least once every other academic year thereafter.
L. The evaluation of a Department Chair shall be conducted in the same manner as an administrative evaluation with the following modifications:
1. In place of the list of individuals specified in Section I.1, the Vice President or his or her designee shall solicit information about the Department Chair's performance of his or her duties and responsibilities as chair from appropriate faculty and staff in the department, as well as any others the Vice President or his or her designee believes should have relevant information the faculty member's performance as Department Chair.
2. Rather than recording the evaluation on an administrative evaluation form, the Vice President or his or her designee shall record the evaluation on the Department Chair Evaluation Form (see Appendix C).
M. The evaluation of a Department Chair is a specialized evaluation that is separate from and in addition to the normal evaluation of the Department Chair as a faculty member.
Departments Without Chairs
N. The administrator assigned the supervisory responsibility for a department without a Department Chair shall assume the responsibilities delegated to the Department Chair by this Article. The Child Development Center Director shall assume the responsibilities delegated to the Department Chair by this Article for the evaluation of Child Development Center Teachers.
Evaluation of Temporary Faculty
O. Temporary faculty shall receive a formal evaluation before the end of their second semester of employment and at least once every six semesters of employment thereafter. In each instance (other than those in which an administrative evaluation is applicable), the evaluation shall be a basic evaluation conducted in the manner specified in Section F, above. However, temporary faculty members shall not have the right to receive a comprehensive evaluation following a basic evaluation as provided in Sections F.5 and 6. Nevertheless, any temporary faculty member with seniority rights may request a comprehensive evaluation following a basic evaluation, and that request shall be granted if it follows an evaluation in which the faculty member's performance was rated "unsatisfactory."
Evaluations of all temporary faculty already on a seniority list shall commence in the first fall semester that occurs after the effective date of this article.
P. To initiate a formal evaluation, the appropriate Vice President or his or her designee, shall send the temporary faculty member, and his or her Department Chair, a notice informing them that the faculty member will be evaluated as provided in this article and specifying the time by which the evaluation should be completed.
Evaluation of Probationary Faculty
Q. Probationary faculty shall be evaluated as specified in Article 42, Tenure Review and Evaluation of Contract (Probationary) Faculty.
Effective Date
R. This Article became effective on July 1, 2003. The initial use of the evaluation procedures set forth in the Article to evaluate tenured and temporary faculty were phased in as follows: faculty members whose employee numbers are evenly divisible by three were to be evaluated using the procedures during the first fall semester that follows the effective date of this Article; faculty members whose employee numbers are divisible by three with a remainder of 1 were to be evaluated using the procedures during the second fall semester that follows the effective date of this Article; and faculty members whose employee numbers are divisible by three with a remainder of 2 were to be evaluated using the procedures during the third fall semester that follows the effective date of this Article. In the case of tenured faculty, if the employee number is an odd number the initial evaluation under this article shall be a basic evaluation. If the employee number is an even number the initial evaluation under this article shall be a comprehensive evaluation.
See Appendix C for an evaluation timetable projected into the future based on the starting dates discussed above