Development of tools for the objective evaluation of the professional activities of the research and academic staff is necessary for quality improvement and certification procedures. A system for evaluation of the educational activity has recently been established at the Polytechnical University of Valencia (Spain). The parameter used is called "Educational Activity Index" (EAI) and provides an objective evaluation of: 1) planning of the educational activity, which includes: formation of the staff, courses description, information provided to the students, and teaching materials and resources; 2) development of the educational activity, including: imparted teaching, tutorships performed, time devoted to evaluation, and other educational activities; and, 3) results, which includes: opinion polls to students, students performance results, observance of tutorship timetables, and compliance on the scheduled delivery dates of marks to students. In this respect, for each of these three dimensions, scores are obtained and, by applying a formula which gives different weights to each of the scores, the EAI is obtained. Individual thresholds for obtaining a qualitative evaluation of the quality of the educational activity (Very Favourable, Favourable or Unfavourable) are established depending on the teaching capacity (number of credits that theoretically can be assigned to each teaching staff member). Here, we evaluate the application of the EAI to the educational evaluation of the staff of the Department of Biotechnology of the Polytechnical University of Valencia (Spain). According to the EAI based qualitative evaluation, 18.6% of the staff achieved a Very Favourable evaluation, 81.4% a Favourable evaluation, and 0.0% an Unfavourable evaluation. An important variation has been found in the indicators studied, mostly for indicators related to planning and development of the educational activity. We have compared the different indicators between the different work contract categories and have found that the highest EAI values were obtained for the full-time hired staff, followed by the full-time permanent staff, and the part-time staff. Also, when comparing the indicators between the staff with Favourable and Very Favourable evaluations, the latter had higher values for those related to the elaboration of teaching materials, credits imparted, and other educational activities. A high correlation has been found between the imparted teaching and the EAI (r=0.83), as well as between the teaching capacity and the EAI (r=0.77). In consequence, those staff members that give more lectures and have more teaching credits assigned get higher EAI values. We have developed a new indicator, which we call "Educational Activity Quality Index" (EAQI), which is a tool for comparing the quality of the educational activity of the research and academic staff, although EAQI values are still highly dependent on the development of the educational activity indicator (r=0.541) and teaching capacity (r=0.353). We consider that EAI and EAQI are useful tools for measuring the educational activity and its quality, although some improvements might be implemented.
