Academic Quality Work: A Handbook for Improvement (review)

The title of this book aptly describes its purpose and content. It is a handbook—a practical set of exercises and summaries of strategies actually used in different settings—built around the theme that the assessment of academic quality work is optimally useful when assessment is planned and implemented for improvement. Thus, assessment is the responsibility of the faculty.

Assessment that is built on internal faculty commitment will be more useful than assessment driven by external control or threat. Moreover, and very evident in the contents of the book, it is a book based on the three authors’ years of experience in conducting and using assessment strategies to improve the quality of higher education. They present a strong case that the best return of investment in assessment is its formative use—that is, assessment is to help important stakeholders learn how to enhance the quality of higher education, rather than to focus on quality assurance.

They begin this practice-filled book with the argument that higher education needs to be more intentional in enhancing “academic quality work,” which involves a systematic program for faculty and administrators to better understand the work of teaching and research so that the quality of their work can be improved. It thus entails teaching and research but is more than carrying out these responsibilities. Faculty and others are to employ strategies based on principles of quality and criteria for evaluating their work (p. 17).

Moreover, the enhancement of academic quality work must arise from the faculty’s commitment toward improvement that is not solely dependent on receiving more resources for their work. Faculty can be more systematic in thinking and planning assessment strategies and processes in improving their work. To the authors, “Most colleges and universities could become better than they are without additional spending” (p. 255).

To guide higher education leaders in achieving this goal, the authors present “seven principles of good practice for quality work” (p. 52): define quality in terms of outcomes, focus on how things get done, work collaboratively, base decisions on evidence, strive for coherence, learn from best practice, and make continuous improvement a priority.

The authors focus on “education quality work” since it highlights teaching and learning quality—and thus the undergraduate programs—at a university. Education quality work “covers five focal areas: learning objectives, curriculum, teaching and learning methods, student learning assessment, and quality assurance” (p. 33). They argue that a peer review process can too easily focus on research productivity, which does not help faculty become more engaged in assessing teaching and learning.

In their strategy, faculty need to be intimately involved, and the most effective strategy from an organizational point of view is to focus on the academic department. They label the process of assessment the “academic audit,” which has as one of its goals “to bring professionals together for structured, action-oriented conversations about academic quality” (p. 78) and to “to engage the faculty in meaningful dialogues and to trigger academic soul-searching” (p. 95).

They have a strong bias—one with which I strongly agree—in creating processes and procedures that invite major stakeholders—especially the faculty—to engage in deliberative conversations in a safe environment that does not stifle but rather promotes honest disagreement and joint problem solving. It is an argument for assessment being one of “sitting beside” rather than “standing over”—terms that I like to stress in assessment. To them, this strategy of review “can be a powerful tool in nurturing change” (p. 79).

And improvement is to come in a certain way. “Using additional resources as the foundation for all improvement creates the wrong type of conversation—focusing on resources rather than the more basic question of what professors do with the resources they have and challenging basic assumptions” (p. 78).

At the core of the improvement process is the “departmental self-study,” a staple in almost all departmental reviews and accreditation procedures. The...