Glenda Garvey Teaching Academy

Guidelines for Completing the Portfolio

The following guidelines will help you prepare your educational portfolio using the academy portfolio template. They will help you make decisions about both content and organization.

General Instructions

1. Your portfolio can have up to five sections:
   • Teaching and evaluation (required)
   • Mentoring and advising,
   • Enduring educational materials
   • Educational administration and leadership
   • Educational research
2. You have an overall page limit of only 5 pages, front and back, with a minimum of 11 point font size. Your goal is to showcase your best work as an educator by picking the sections that will enable you to balance breadth (number of sections) with depth (substance within a section). You are not required to complete all five sections.
3. Group and describe together (i.e., in the same table) similar activities (e.g., lectures to a given learner population).
4. Emphasize your most recent work (e.g., that done in the last 4-5 years).
5. Be as concise as possible, but remember to include enough detail that reviewers from schools and backgrounds other than your own will understand and be able to judge the quantity and quality of your work.
6. Aggregate information about quantity and quality as much as possible (e.g., average learner evaluations across courses and/or across years; summarize the key points from peer evaluations).
7. Document and add detail to your aggregations and summaries in the portfolio by including relevant documents in the supporting documents section (i.e., appendix) and by providing explicit cross references to them. (e.g., learner evaluations broken down by course and year; complete letter from a peer with comments). Remember, however, that not all reviewers will have the supporting documents (or your CV) when they do their reviews.
8. As directed, begin each section with a brief narrative summarizing your goals, philosophy, preparation, and ongoing improvement that guide your practice as an educator, specific to the section.
9. Organize the remainder of each section as a series of tables, duplicated from the master table provided for each section in the academy portfolio template

Evidence of Quantity

1. All sections ask for evidence of quantity. Quantity refers to such things as:
   • Duration (number of years),
   • Time commitment (usually expressed as hours per year),
   • Numbers of learners (usually expressed as learners per year),
   • Size (number of pages of materials), etc.

Evidence of Quality

1. All sections ask for evidence of quality. Quality indicators for each activity can include but are not necessarily limited to the following:
   • Evaluations from peers and/or students, including if possible, evidence of improvement over time and normative data (e.g., average learner evaluations of a similar cohort of faculty).
   • Summaries of course/program director
   • Repeat invitations to participate in the same activity
   • Awards (including the criteria for judgment by peers)
   • Growth in quantity
   • Learners’ success (in terms of their publications, grants, etc.)
   • Quotes from supporting letters

Evidence of Scholarship

1. Scholarship refers to engagement with an educational community to improve one’s own and others’ practices. [insert URL: http://www.aamc.org/meded/mededportal/fact-sheet.pdf]
2. It is not expected that you will have evidence of scholarship for all activities
3. Indicators of scholarship can include but is not necessarily limited the following:
   • Publications with descriptions and/or evaluations of activities
   • Invited presentations (e.g., workshops, discussion group) sharing methods or effective strategies
   • Samples/examples of materials shared with peers
   • Impact and use elsewhere (describe nature of adoption and use elsewhere; indicated inclusion in national repositories and “hit” statistics)
   • Description of your practice of reflective critique

Classifying Types of Educational Contributions

1. The Teaching and Evaluation activities can include but are not necessarily limited to the following:
   • Lecturing
   • Facilitating small group discussions
   • Education within the community
   • Clinical teaching (bedside or chairside)
   • Laboratory teaching
   • Conducting distance learning
   • Conducting faculty development
   • Clinical skills assessment (e.g. OSCEs)
   • Serving as an oral examiner
2. Mentoring and advising activities can include but are not necessarily limited to the following:
   • Participating in a thesis or dissertation committee
   • Serving as one-on-one mentor to learner
   • Advising learners about career options
3. Design of Enduring Educational Materials can include but is not limited to the following:
   • Simulation development
   • Computer-based instructional materials in CD or web-based formats; instructional software; audiovisual materials (e.g. instructional videos, audiotapes, slide sets)
   • Textbooks or textbook chapters
   • Review articles or extended abstracts with clear educational value
   • Items used for learner evaluations, such as multiple choice questions written for the National Board Exams or OSCE based evaluations
   • Case vignettes used in case based teaching, problem based learning, or team based learning
   • Manuals, guidelines, or curriculum guides
   • Workshop/Group activity design
   • Continuing education materials
   • Patient education materials
   • Tools to create enduring materials (e.g., template for creating cases)
   • Resources used for conducting teaching sessions
     
     Materials that SHOULD NOT be considered for the section on design of enduring educational materials include the following:
   • A syllabus that is only used for one course, or by one individual , or in one school
   • A set of slides that is only used in one course, or by one individual, or in one school
   • Review articles written principally for research with limited educational applicability
   • Materials developed more to communicate research findings than educational purposes
   • Self-published materials: textbooks that have no clear evidence of dissemination
   • Course websites used solely for course management, communication, or clerical purposes
4. Educational administration and leadership activities can include but are not necessarily limited to the following:
   • Chair of education/curriculum committee within school
   • Member of education/curriculum committee within school
   • Leadership in curriculum development within school
   • Course director
   • Course committee member
   • Committee chair or member for regional/national/international education organization
   • Program Director or Co-director
   • Assistant/Associate Dean for Education
   • National exam service
   • Licensing board service
   • Educational society membership
   • Peer reviewer for educational journal
5. Educational Research activities are studies conducted to generate “new knowledge” about learning, teaching, evaluation, etc. Often educational research is funded separately from ongoing educational activities. Research methods can vary and may include but are not limited to the following
   • literature review and analysis
   • quantitative designs (e.g., randomized control trials of educational interventions)
   • qualitative designs (surveys and questionnaires)
   • mixed method designs