Faculty Responsibilities

Instructional Load

The faculty instructional load policy is based on a year-round academic calendar. The academic deans and directors will take into account the type of courses and teaching load in order to determine a specific faculty member’s workload. Contact hours can be spread between day, evening, or online sections as well as between semesters or departments in order to get to the appropriate number of contact hours. Full-time faculty may be required to teach in the summer. In some cases, faculty will be paid overload based on their instructional workload.

Assessment of Student Learning

It is expected as part of the teaching/learning process that faculty will conduct assessments to determine their students' attainment of the institutional core abilities, the course competencies, and the programmatic learning outcomes. Documentation of these assessments will take place through the learning management system, Canvas, and through the Annual Programmatic Assessment Report.  Faculty will analyze the assessment results and improve their curriculum to assist students in achieving the desired outcomes.

30-Day Check-in Survey and End-of-Course Survey

Getting student feedback supports our accreditation process and helps us continuously improve. The information gained provides valuable insights that can aid decision-making and lead to a better student experience.

Courses with low student response rates or low enrollment under five students will only be available with consultation with the Office of Institutional Research and Effectiveness on a need-to-know basis that follows FERPA guidelines.

Communication

Dunwoody's course satisfaction survey tool, Watermark, integrates with Canvas. The notification system in Canvas cannot be adjusted; therefore, students will receive pop-up notifications every time they log on. We recommend they complete the survey early to avoid disruptive alerts.  If students raise concerns, please remind them why this information is important to you and to Dunwoody.

You are required to encourage student participation in the 30-day Check-In and End-of-Course Surveys. The goal is a 75% response rate from enrolled students. The easiest way to hit this goal is to dedicate class time for participation.

Students will receive a pre-survey announcement email two days before the survey opens. Students who still need to complete the survey will receive an email every two days of the last 4 days of the semester or shortened session. You will also receive an email notice during the last 4 days of the survey period if your course participation is less than 75%.  You will not receive notifications for modular or short session courses; however, you can inquire with your supervisor.

Fall & Spring Semester

Students will receive an email and notifications within Canvas the Monday morning two weeks before a class ends; surveys close at 11:59 p.m. on the last day of the semester.

J-Term/Summer Semester and Sessions 1 & 2 (shortened terms)

Students will receive an email and notifications within Canvas the Monday morning one week before a class ends; surveys close at 11:59 p.m. on the last day of the semester.

Questions

The included questions are acquired from validated research question banks. Some are used for benchmarking from national student satisfaction or engagement surveys.

You can add up to two custom questions to your End-of-Course Survey beginning 14 days before and up to the date the survey is administered to the students.

Results

You can review your End-of-Course Surveys results after grades are due. You will receive an email when you have access to your individual surveys.

Administrators, Deans, and Directors can review results as soon as the survey opens and will regularly monitor the response rates until the survey(s) are no longer available.

Instructor Support

End-of-Course surveys are administered by the Office of Institutional Research and Effectiveness. The office offers individual consultations to discuss your results, design custom questions, or find ways to increase student survey engagement. For instructor support regarding this software solution, contact the director, Lisa Smith, at research@dunwoody.edu.

Faculty Office Hours

It is important for faculty to be able to establish reasonable expectations of availability, and it is important for students to be able to find and communicate with faculty in a reasonable time frame. In order to balance those needs, all faculty members who are currently teaching need to declare (and keep) office hours throughout the semester, and need to declare personal preferences with respect to communication with students.

Full-time faculty should hold office hours at least five hours per week, preferably distributed across more than one day a week. Faculty should publish office hours on the syllabus of each course they teach. Due to the time, location, and modality of courses, it is understood that some flexibility within this rule may best serve students’ needs for access to faculty.

Adjunct faculty should make every effort to give students a way to communicate with themselves in a reasonable time frame throughout the semester and need to declare personal preferences with respect to communication with students. Holding office hours one hour prior to or after class is a preferred practice.

Syllabi

Faculty will create a syllabus for each of their classes for each academic term they are assigned to teach. Syllabi are created through Simple Syllabus and reviewed by the appropriate Academic Dean or Director. Syllabi must be published in Canvas by the Friday before the course is scheduled to start. 

Exact deadlines are published on the Dunwoody Dates Outlook calendar by the Office of Instruction.

Book Adoptions

A timely adoption of books is vital to the success of our students. Title IV Financial Aid rules state that all academic institutions must have a complete list of textbook costs for the students to reference as they register for courses. Additionally, timely adoptions allow our bookstore operations manager the appropriate time to get the most cost-effective options for our students. Book adoptions are due during Week 10 in the semester prior. J-Term and Summer term books are adopted at the same time as Spring textbooks. For instance:

  • Fall books are generally due in early April
  • J-Term, Spring, and Summer books are generally due in early November

Exact deadlines are published on the Dunwoody Dates Outlook calendar by the Office of Instruction.

Course Attendance

Dunwoody is an attendance-taking institution. Please refer to the Best Practices in Attendance tab for a complete list of guidelines.

Teaching an Online Class

Dunwoody is committed to providing its online students' with a faculty who have been trained in the best practices in online teaching and learning. All faculty teaching online classes should complete a course or certificate that ensures the faculty is prepared to provide online students an equivalent experience as students taking courses on campus. Dunwoody provides funds for faculty to complete the Online Learning Consortium's (OLC) Online Teaching Foundations course, the OLC's Teaching as Online Adjunct Faculty: Practical Resources for Instruction, Quality Matters' online teaching workshops or certificate, as well as Dunwoody's in-house Instructional Strategies in the Virtual Classroom workshop. In addition, each fall, the Office of Instruction provides a 1-hour seminar on the legal requirements for online teaching at the Fall Conference. Faculty who teach, or plan to teach online, must attend the hybrid seminar, or complete the asynchronous course online.