Initiating conversations about representations of quality, particularly to identify criteria for judging the quality of teaching, is essential in promoting democratic social transformation in higher education. Examples of quality representations include stature and competence of the faculty, performance of students in courses and later, datedness and integrity of course content, collaboration among faculty members, and supervisory review by administrators. Although complete explanations of quality representations is difficult to achieve, conversations about the quality criteria in higher education programs have the potential not only to direct researchers and policy makers’ attention to the validity of the representations, but also to consider the inclusion or exclusion of certain stakeholders’ perspectives. Some of the criteria reflecting the quality representation may be conflicting ideas about what insures the impact or effectiveness of education practice, and dialectic conversations are critical to expose the narratives of power and better engage different and multiple voice representation in higher education programs.

Few studies address the espoused values and engage diverse stakeholders in conversations about quality criteria. Reflecting perspectives from three regional contexts, West European, East European, and American, the contributors at this proposed round table use the settings of various higher education reforms in their countries to provide detailed accounts on what these reforms mean for different stakeholders and how their meanings redirect to the representations of the quality of teaching.

The impetus for this roundtable comes from contributors’ belief in the value of sharing the experienced challenges when implementing the reforms’ quality procedures for teaching (Ryan & DeStefano, 2000). The overarching scope is to discuss representations of the quality of teaching and reveal the espoused values of various stakeholders (students, administrators, faculty members, and members of the Educational Studies Institutes) for higher education programs in Europe and the United States of America. The conversations in each country case navigate from images of the quality as measured to representations of quality as experienced (Stake & Schwandt, 2006). The across cases analysis intends to contribute to the current conceptualizations of the educative approach of evaluation. (Cronbach & Associates, 1980).

Prior work on theory-based and responsive evaluation (Abma & Stake, 2001) (Stake, 1999) (Stake, R. 2004, Weiss, 1998) conceptualized the evaluator's role as an educator and of the program evaluation as an educative springboard for alternative plans for social action. These studies have advanced supporting frameworks for an educative approach evaluation (Greene, 2004) (Greene, Destefano, Burgon, & Hall, 2006). While studies presented at this round table use these conceptualizations as theoretical framework, it does so by giving attention to the less-studied aspects of the evaluators’ educational thinking in relation to the contextual power of the educational program and practice.

The contextual power of educational programs and practices is defined by the ability of the educational activities to appear in learners’ lives, to have sufficient power and potential to reach meaningful outcomes, and, as appropriate to change contextual norms (Greene, Boyce, & Ahn, 2011). The quality of teaching in higher education is particularly of interest because representations of teaching quality are often limited to the faculty’ competencies and/or pedagogies mandated by institutions or policy makers. However, representing quality of teaching requires not only understanding what instructors know and do, but understanding the organizational and normative contexts.

Towards this aim, the contributors elaborate the following issues identified in the dialogues between educational evaluators and various stakeholders:  

1. Are there conflicting narratives about the criteria for judging the quality of teaching in higher education programs? 
2. In what ways do the representations of the quality of teaching in higher education reflect faculty members’ activities, teaching practices and educationalist approaches?     

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