NWCCU Accreditation: Faculty

Any NWCCU Eligibility Requirement or Accreditation Standard is fair game for a question from an evaluator. Evaluators will likely be particularly interested in your perspectives on FVCC’s student profile, mission, core themes, challenges and adaptability, sustainability (both financially and in terms of the quality and competitiveness of academic offerings and student services), and interactions between/among faculty, staff, students, and administrators. Below is a series of questions we expect the NWCCU evaluators to ask.

1. What are the primary, most important, changes faculty have implemented to improve departments and programs?
   • What data or information did you use to determine these specific changes were necessary?
   • What data or information did you (or will you) use to evaluate the impact and effectiveness of these changes?
   • To date, how effective have these changes been? What is working well – and what is not?
   • How did these changes support the mission and core themes?

Examples of change include:

• Program-level and/or course learning outcomes - or other curriculum changes
• Policies, procedures, practices
• Pedagogy
• Faculty and staff hiring
• Faculty and staff professional development
• Facilities/equipment
• Advising
• Experiential learning opportunities
• Budget/equipment requests

2. Given the time, energy, and effort devoted to General Education, you are also likely to be asked the following:
   • Would you please describe the process by which FVCC created the General Education and Related Instruction assessment process?
     • What was the role of faculty members?
     • How involved were the faculty?
   • To what extent has your department/program been involved in the assessment and, by extension, improvement of the student learning in General Education?
3. Evaluators will be very interested in assessment and improvement of student learning. They are likely to ask the following:
   • How are your program learning outcomes shared with students?  When were they last reviewed/updated?
   • How are your course learning outcomes shared?  When were they last reviewed/updated?
   • Do you have an Advisory Board and/or other method(s) for ensuring your program-level and course learning outcomes are current?
   • Do you have a curriculum map of program-level learning outcomes and specific courses?
   • Please describe your department’s/program’s assessment process(es).  Who is responsible for department- and program-level assessment?
   • What have you learned from department/program/course assessment – and what changes have you made?  What has been the impact of those changes?
4. How does your department/program support the institution's mission and core themes?
   • Where and in what ways is your department/program exceeding the expectations you have set?
   • Where and in what ways is your department/program falling short?
   • What are you doing to address those shortcomings?
5. Since the last NWCCU site visit, in what ways have the institution and your department/program had to adapt to changing circumstances - in terms of both external and internal factors?
   • How well have the institution and your department/program adapted to change?
   • Thinking about the future, how well-equipped are the institution and your department/program to adapt to change?
6. What are the primary challenges the institution and your department/program have had to overcome since the last NWCCU site visit (Spring 2012)?
   • What are the primary challenges the institution and your department/program currently face?
   • What challenges are on the horizon?
7. Are your professional development needs being met?  Please describe.
8. Do you feel safe on campus?  Why or why not?
9. Describe your experience with the evaluation / tenure process.  How often are you evaluated?  Is the process beneficial?
10. How are students supported on campus?  How do you know that you are meeting student needs?
11. What does shared governance mean to you?  Please describe what shared governance looks like on this campus.
12. Evaluators may ask questions about specific Accreditation Standards. Examples include the following: