A course portfolio represents a teacher's most effective practices. When teaching is approached as an act of data-driven practice, the course portfolio can allow you to explore how effectively the goals of student learning are being achieved, from your point of view and from the perspective of student work. In this way, student and teacher practices inform and serve each other, and this bi-directional relationship is captured in the course portfolio.

The structure of a course portfolio explains course goals, how goals were implemented, student performance achieved, and the teacher's reflection about what was achieved and what can be bettered in future offerings. A richer portfolio tracks a course's evolution, showing what was learned and improved over time. In contrast to other reviews, students' voice and performance is evident through student work, not through student ratings. Also, instead of a generalized teaching statement, the reflections of the teacher are encompassed in an in-depth analysis of his or her teaching and future teaching goals (Bernstein 2006).