Course evaluations are a platform for students to express their opinions about their professors and classes, but as it stands currently, there is a lot of room for improvement.
At a Faculty Senate meeting Tuesday, they questioned how effective student evaluations are when it comes to accurately assessing the quality of an instructor or a course itself. Jennifer Johnson-Leung, chair of the Teaching and Advising Committee, expressed her concern that the evaluations are more of a popularity contest than anything else. The trouble with this is that everything is a popularity contest.
While course evaluations are in need of improvements, they are still important for professors to receive feedback on their teaching strategies. Professors should be able to read evaluations and change their teaching styles and habits to best fit how their students are learning or not learning. They need to be open to criticism and accept comments about what they could do better from year to year.
The best way to do this would be to focus the evaluations more on the portion of short answer questions offered.
Compared to the multiple choice questions, with open-answered questions a professor might receive some actual constructive criticism they can use in future semesters. These questions give faculty information that expands on why an individual student – or multiple students – don”t feel like they learned what they should.
Open-ended questions can also allow students to explain different aspects of a class aside from evaluating their specific instructor. Questions could give students the chance to elaborate on what they actually learned in the course compared to what was set in the course objectives, for example.
There will always be students who use the open answer section to leave inappropriate and unhelpful critiques, but there are also those students who take it seriously. If a professor is bad, students should be able to say exactly what it was that is bad about them.
Students are paying a significant sum to attend UI and the quality of their education is highly dependent on the quality of their professors.
The value of open-ended questions outweighs whatever negative comments may come as a result of them. They give students the opportunity to explain exactly what they want to get out of their education as opposed to rating their course on a scale from 0-4, because honestly, what instructor can make actual changes based on that rating system?
Open-ended questions can leave room to expose larger issues that may extend beyond the curriculum.
Evaluations are important for students and professors. It gives professors an idea of how they can improve their classes in future semesters. It”s also important for students, because it gives them an opportunity to provide criticism of their professors and classes and improve the level of learning they receive. It allows them a voice in their own education.
– CW