A course peer review is conducted by a team of 3 faculty members who have taught online and/or hybrid for at least 3 years. All peer reviewers at SCC have have also designed an online course as well. One member is the team chair, one is the subject-matter expert, and the other is an external reviewer (external to the department, in the case of SCC). All peer reviewers have completed Quality Matters certification in Applying the Rubric and are QM certified Peer Reviewers.
The peer review team receives course information from the Dean of Online & E-Learning and conduct a pre-review meeting that includes the faculty designer. In this meeting, the faculty designer provides information they would like to highlight about the course and their design choices, and reviewers have the option to ask question of the designer as well. Once this information is exchanged, the faculty designer leaves the meeting, and the peer reviewers discuss their review schedule and review the process for appropriate feedback to provide for standards, referring closely to the examples and annotations to guide them.
Peer reviewers are provided with student-view access to courses that they review, because they are looking at those from a learner's perspective in relation to the QM standards. The review can take up to 3 weeks to complete, after which the review will convene again for a post-review meeting to discuss findings and final course score. At this time, reviewers will discuss any standard where they were not in unanimous agreement. Though QM does not require unanimous agreement on all standards, it is recommended to discuss these standards to assure that nothing has been overlooked and the scoring and feedback is accurate and appropriate. A standard is "Met" if 2 out of 3 reviewers mark it so. Likewise, it is "Not Met" if 2 of 3 reviewers marks it as "Not Met."
If the course meets all 3-point standards and has an overall score of 85% or above, the course meets QM standards and expectations and is internally certified at SCC. If it does not, the feedback is provided to the faculty designer who will make modifications, choosing to meet with an instructional designer for assistance if desired, and resubmitted for a second review by the team chair. The chair reviews those standards that were previously marked "Not Met," and re-scores those to determine if the course then meets QM standards and expectations. It is the goal of Quality Matters, and this process at SCC, that all courses submitted for review meet QM standards and expectations.
Where can I find more information about how to learn from colleagues during the peer review process?