When Teachers Go Back to School

Just outside the Derek Bok Center for Teaching and Learning, there is a long, empty hallway strewn with several plants along the side. Dropped off when they were struggling for survival, the orchid, aloe, and spider plants have now been nursed back to health by the center’s staff.

Embedded deep within the third floor of the Science Center, the Bok Center does not nearly have the space for a greenhouse, but the plants are highly reflective of the center’s responsibility for taking in and turning around Teaching Fellows (TFs) who haven’t quite made the cut.

For the past 30 years, subpar TFs have turned to the center—made up of just two classrooms and a dozen offices—ready to help them hone their skills.

“Our deal is that we just try to be as helpful as possible,” said James Wilkinson, director of the center.

MAKING THE GRADE

For many TFs, the Committee on Undergraduate Education (CUE) ratings published each year offer an important tool for self-evaluation of their teaching skills, and the Bok Center also uses the CUE guide marks to grade the TFs, Wilkinson said.

TFs who receive CUE scores of 4.5 or better are rewarded with a “Harvard University Certificate of Distinction of Teaching.”

But the TFs who earn marks of 3.0 or lower receive a letter from Dean of the College Benedict H. Gross ’71 notifying them that action must be taken.

“The letter also goes to the director of graduate studies in the department and to a designated associate of the Bok Center, and suggests that the TF be in touch with that person for retraining,” Gross wrote in an e-mail.

The Bok Center works to fix the problem as quickly as possible, said Rebecca Hunter, program coordinator of the center, by trying to get them in before they begin teaching their next classes.

Although these TFs are not required to visit the Bok Center, it is often in their best interests to do so, Wilkinson said.

Required to become TFs, they usually do so in preparation for a career in academia, said Adam G. Beaver ’00, a TF in the history department since 2003.

“The average faculty member spends about 60 percent of their time teaching, so it’s crucial for graduate students preparing for this to get some serious training,” he said.

‘NICE GUY WHO CAN’T TEACH’

Over the past few years, the Bok Center has seen a number of bad TFs come and go through its doors, and there are several overriding characteristics that show up time and time again, Wilkinson said.

There is the “nice guy who can’t teach”—the TF who goes into a class with good intentions but does not understand how to guide a meaningful discussion—and there is the graduate student who does not understand how to connect with a “lowly” undergraduate. Then there is the foreign TF who doesn’t speak English well, as well as the one who is not familiar with the American education system.

Wilkinson said the majority of poorly rated TFs come from math- and science-related departments.

“The chances are that the discussions are lively in a Shakespeare course, so you can learn on the job without having to be a good teacher at the start,” Wilkinson said. “If you’re trying to get students to brush up on derivatives or covalent bonding and they are all pre-med, they don’t really care about covalent bonding and just want to get to medical school.”

TF’ing 101

The Bok Center deals with these cases on a highly intensive, individualized basis, Wilkinson said.

Similar to a health nutritionist crafting a dietary plan, members of the Bok Center offer numerous recommendations for failing TFs—they are taught how to frame and signpost their discussions, ask follow-up questions, keep conversation on track, and are given tips on what to do with dominant or shy students.

But perhaps the most important lesson is how to bridge the gap between the TF and the students.

“In the vast majority of cases, the knowledge of the TF is sound or accurate,” Wilkinson said. “The real question is conveying that knowledge.”

Videotaping represents one of the Bok Center’s most valuable tools for providing feedback—hundreds and hundreds of tapes clutter the center’s bookshelves.

The center tapes TFs teaching their classes, and afterwards staff members provide feedback on the main areas for improvement.

“It’s like when athletes watch game-day videos to get an awareness of the field,” Beaver said. “You get to cultivate a sense of how the section is going.”

Given the effectiveness of this evaluation method, some departments have started to require all TFs—both good and bad—to be videotaped once a semester.

“It’s invaluable,” said Thomas W. Judson, a preceptor in the Mathematics Department, who reviewed the tape of David J. Geraghty, a TF in Mathematics 1b, “Calculus, Series, and Differential Equations.”

“David just got videotaped, and we could observe the entire class,” Judson said. “We could see how the teaching is going, what he is doing right, what he can improve upon.”

A PERFECT 5.0

Overall, the center is successful in turning around TFs with low CUE scores, said Erin Driver-Linn, associate director for research at the Bok Center.

In an academic year, fewer than five of the TFs who come to the center because of low CUE ratings receive a “second strike,” she said.

“We’ve had people get bad CUE evaluations, and come back with the help of the math department and the Bok Center to win a teaching award [for earning a CUE rating of a 4.5 or above],” Judson said.

The number of bad TFs constitutes a very small minority in the vast pool of section leaders, according to Driver-Linn.

Only three to five percent of the 1,224 TFs ultimately receive a letter from Gross. In contrast, approximately 15 to 20 percent achieve scores of 4.5 or above.

“The vast majority do an excellent job teaching, and their median CUE rating is 4.2,” Gross wrote.

Last year, 85 TFs received a perfect score, Driver-Linn said.