Evaluating your practice

This toolkit provides a wide range of resources, guidance and tools to help you embed collaborative, evidence-based decision making into your practice and to evaluate your teaching across varying levels of impact. The toolkit includes: 

• information and guidance about the University's approach to evaluation
• guidance and resources to help you evaluate your own practice
• advice and guidance on how to embed the Student Voice into your evaluation practices
• examples of different evaluation methods you can use and real case study examples
• information about the University's Evaluation Advocates Network including how to get involved.

Our evaluation principles

To help facilitate consistent evaluation practices across the University, this toolkit and our approach to evaluation has been built on five key principles (inspired by the Evaluation Collective manifesto, 2022). These principles are: 

1. Evaluation for learning: evaluation should help our students and staff to develop
2. Enables informed decision-making: evaluation should provide the data and information to inform decision-making at all levels of the University
3. Embedded and sustainable: evaluation should be embedded into practice, focussed and consistent
4. Strategically aligned: evaluation should be aligned to university strategies at the high-level and be enriched by perspectives and insight from all levels of the organisation
5. Creative and participatory: evaluation should be innovative and should include the Student Voice

This introductory video explains in more detail why evaluation is important, how effective evaluation contributes to continued enhancement of the Student Experience as well as our own practice, and the University's five evaluation principles. 

Further support

Further support to help you develop, plan and deliver your evaluation effectively or to develop your Theory of Change is available on request.

Access and Success

For support to evaluate Access and Success related activities (e.g., interventions from the Access and Participation Plan), please visit the Access and Success Evaluation SharePoint for advice, guidance and training or contact the Access and Success team directly. 

• Access and Success: Evaluation SharePoint (opens in new window)
• Access and Success: Meet the team (opens in new window)

Teaching practice and teaching enhancement

For support to evaluate activities related to your teaching practice and teaching enhancement, the visit the Evaluation Toolkit for advice and guidance or contact the Teaching Excellence team directly. Bespoke "Introduction to Theory of Change" workshops can be arranged for your team or local area upon request.

• Evaluation Toolkit: Teaching and Learning
• Contact the Teaching Excellence team (opens in new window)

Faculty specific support

Evaluation support is also available from faculty-based Evaluation Advocates. Evaluation Advocates have first-hand experience of thinking through and writing Theory of Change and evaluation plans and can offer informal advice, guidance or feedback to support you in thinking through your own Theory of Change or evaluation plan.

• Faculty of Science and Engineering Evaluation Advocates Network (opens in new window)
• Faculty of Science and Engineering Evaluation SharePoint (opens in new window)