Is Tutor Performance Dependent on the Tutorial Group's Productivity?: Toward Further Resolving of Inconsistencies in Tutor Performance

Abstract

Background: Many studies have been conducted on tutor performance in problem-based curricula. In the past, the implicit assumption behind these studies was that tutor performance is a relatively stable characteristic. More recent studies demonstrate that a tutor's performance may be dependent on other circumstances, such as the level of structure in the curricular materials. The aim of this study was to investigate whether a tutor's performance is also dependent on the tutorial group's productivity. Purpose: The idea is that low-productive tutorial groups require much more input from a tutor than high-productive groups. In the problem-based curriculum under investigation, most tutors guide 2 tutorial groups within the same unit. A salient finding in this problem-based curriculum was that some tutors who guide 2 tutorial groups within the same unit have discrepancies in their tutor performance across the 2 groups. This finding might be explained by differences in both tutorial groups. In this study, first the scope of the discrepancy phenomena was studied. Second, the relation between the tutor's performance and the tutorial group's productivity was studied. Methods: The data set for this study included 136 tutors who, in total, ran 272 tutorial groups (each tutor ran 2 groups per unit). The analyses were conducted at the tutorial group level. Students were asked to judge the performance of their tutor. Low, medium, and high levels of tutor performance were distinguished. Tutors who were qualified as "low level of performance" in one tutorial group and "medium level of performance" in the other tutorial group were considered to have a discrepancy in their tutor performance: "discrepancy tutors." The same holds for tutors with medium level of performance in one group and high level of performance in the other group or low level of performance in one group and high level of performance in the other group. All other tutors were considered "nondiscrepancy tutors." The nondiscrepancy tutors had equal levels of performance in both groups: a low, medium, or high level. For each type of tutor (discrepancy tutors and nondiscrepancy tutors) the average tutorial group's productivity score was computed. Results: The results show that 39% of the tutors were classified as discrepancy tutors. In addition, it was found that a discrepancy tutor with a low level of tutor performance in one group also had a low productivity score in this group, whereas a high level of tutor performance corresponds with a high level of the tutorial group's productivity. Furthermore, the results show that nondiscrepancy tutors with a high level of tutor performance receive high tutor performance scores, irrespective of the tutorial group's level of productivity. Conclusions: These findings demonstrate that the tutorial group's productivity is another influencing factor in determining tutor performance. Low-productive groups require much more input from a tutor than high-productive groups. Nondiscrepancy tutors with consistent low levels of tutor performance and discrepancy tutors lack certain competencies that are needed when being confronted with a low-productive tutorial group. Nondiscrepancy tutors with a high level of tutor performance, on the contrary, know how to deal with low-productive tutorial groups, due to which their tutor performance is high irrespective of the tutorial group's productivity. Thus, a tutor's performance seems to be part tutor specific and part situation specific (i.e., dependent on the group's productivity).