> Skip to content
FEATURED:
  • The Evolution of Race in Admissions
Sign In
  • News
  • Advice
  • The Review
  • Data
  • Current Issue
  • Virtual Events
  • Store
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
  • Jobs
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
Sign In
  • News
  • Advice
  • The Review
  • Data
  • Current Issue
  • Virtual Events
  • Store
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
  • Jobs
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
  • News
  • Advice
  • The Review
  • Data
  • Current Issue
  • Virtual Events
  • Store
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
  • Jobs
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
Sign In
ADVERTISEMENT
Newsletter Icon

Teaching

Find insights to improve teaching and learning across your campus. Delivered on Thursdays. To read this newsletter as soon as it sends, sign up to receive it in your email inbox.

November 30, 2017
Share
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Show more sharing options
Share
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook
  • Email
  • Copy Link URLCopied!
  • Print

From: Beckie Supiano

Subject: Everyone Hates Course Evaluations

Happy Thursday, and welcome to Teaching, a newish newsletter from The Chronicle of Higher Education. I’m Beckie Supiano, one of the Chronicle reporters covering teaching and learning.

This week we’re going to devote much of the newsletter to something most professors love to hate: course evaluations. We’ll start with a conversation between me and my editor, Dan Berrett, on the topic before sharing a few resources you may want to check out. Then we’ll unpack what a big new report on the future of undergraduate education has to say about improving the quality of teaching. Let’s get started.

We’re sorry. Something went wrong.

We are unable to fully display the content of this page.

The most likely cause of this is a content blocker on your computer or network. Please make sure your computer, VPN, or network allows javascript and allows content to be delivered from c950.chronicle.com and chronicle.blueconic.net.

Once javascript and access to those URLs are allowed, please refresh this page. You may then be asked to log in, create an account if you don't already have one, or subscribe.

If you continue to experience issues, contact us at 202-466-1032 or help@chronicle.com

Happy Thursday, and welcome to Teaching, a newish newsletter from The Chronicle of Higher Education. I’m Beckie Supiano, one of the Chronicle reporters covering teaching and learning.

This week we’re going to devote much of the newsletter to something most professors love to hate: course evaluations. We’ll start with a conversation between me and my editor, Dan Berrett, on the topic before sharing a few resources you may want to check out. Then we’ll unpack what a big new report on the future of undergraduate education has to say about improving the quality of teaching. Let’s get started.

The Student Voice Matters

Before he was my editor, Dan covered the issues I’m now writing about. Fortunately for me, he saves old emails. One of the things he passed along when I took over the beat was a back-and-forth he’d had with the director of a program at the University of California at Merced in which students conduct teaching assessments. At the time Dan was working on a story about efforts to observe what happens in the classroom, and the Merced example didn’t quite fit.

But it was still in the back of his mind as we talked about stories I might pursue, and I went to Merced this fall to shadow the students as they observed a class, interviewed their peers in another, and gave the professors feedback. My story about it is out now, and you can read it here.

Dan and I recently chatted about why we thought this was a story worth telling — and what makes student feedback so fraught for faculty members.

BS: What made the Merced effort so memorable for you?

DB: It was mostly that the folks at Merced seemed to take student input seriously and to solicit it in a thoughtful way. In contrast, when most professors hear the words “student feedback about teaching,” they tend to get really uncomfortable. But that’s because they often think the words refer to student course evaluations.

BS: Why are so many professors wary of course evaluations?

DB: Most people who study evaluations say what they really measure is student satisfaction. They’re also prone to bias. Even supposedly empirical questions that students are asked, like how promptly their professor returns work, can produce results that are askew. And then students are often asked about things they don’t really know — like whether the professor knows his or her subject. If you take those issues, and then add the fact that these surveys are often used in tenure and promotion decisions and as proxies for really evaluating teaching and learning, you have a recipe for resistance. At the same time, I also remembered something I once heard from Ken Ryalls, who directs IDEA, a nonprofit that has developed a course-evaluation tool and conducts research on the results. He said that what drove him crazy was “this notion that students don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.” But students spend a lot of time watching faculty members teach — more time than anyone else. I thought: He has a point.

So I have a question for you. What did the faculty members at Merced seem to think of the students who observed their courses?

BS: Working with the program is totally voluntary, so the professors who do really respect the students’ perspectives and are eager to see the classroom from their vantage point. The students in the program serve an intermediary role. They are trained, and they’re sharing descriptive feedback. But they’re also students, so they can interpret as well as convey what their peers shared.

DB: I think that’s something you capture really well in the story — particularly the point at the end, where the professor is debriefing with the students. He and they have a concern about students’ freeloading during group work. He thinks he’s engineered a solution by assigning clicker questions. But there’s this nice moment where one of the student observers breaks it to him that the way he sets up his clicker questions doesn’t actually solve the problem. This seemed like such a great example of what you’re talking about: A professor might think he or she is doing something very specific and intentional, but someone who’s watching it unfold and knows how a student thinks can see that it’s not really having that effect. I’m thinking about the fact that participation in this program is voluntary. Was there any common denominator you perceived in the two professors you followed, Marcos Garcia-Ojeda and Noemi Petra?

BS: They shared a desire for excellence. Petra made a comment during her debriefing that she had her dream job. So her motivation to improve — and she was clearly working very hard to — came from that. The example you mentioned above, about the specific way students in Garcia-Ojeda’s class answer clicker questions, is such a small thing. But if you want to be great at something, that kind of detail is important to you. I think that can make someone open to hearing feedback.

DB: That’s a great point. And I think that this desire for excellence probably needs to be paired with other things, like a combination of humility, skill, and perhaps above all, a willingness to be vulnerable.

BS: Most professors can probably call to mind an obnoxious comment from a past course evaluation. But have you ever gotten feedback from students that helped you become a better teacher? Tell me about it, at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com, and your story may appear in a future newsletter.

Another Way to Get Feedback

It turns out that professors aren’t the only ones who think that course evaluations are flawed. Students don’t have much incentive to provide thoughtful feedback at the end of the term, when it’s too late for a professor to make any adjustments that will benefit them. That’s the pitch Claudia Recchi, a recent graduate of Georgetown University, makes for an app she’s built to let students provide feedback throughout the semester. You can check it out here.

But Wait, There’s More

Part of journalism’s job is to bring attention to problems. So it’s only natural that The Chronicle has published a bunch of stories about course evaluations before. Here’s an annotated reading list with a few of our greatest hits:

  • What happens when antidiscrimination law and biased course evaluations collide? After a professor sued her university, we delved into that question.
  • Course evaluations don’t just measure the wrong thing. They’re also used in ways that make no statistical sense, according to research we covered here.
  • Despite their many shortcomings, some experts believe that course evaluations can be redeemed. Read more about those efforts here.
  • Finally, here’s a roundup of some of the memorable comments instructors have received.

High-Quality Education for All

A couple of years back, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences formed a commission to study the undergraduate experience and suggest improvements. That group, the Commission on the Future of Undergraduate Education, released its final report today.

It offers recommendations to attain three main goals, the first of which is ensuring that all students have “high-quality educational experiences that prepare them for success in the 21st century.”

What would it take to meet that goal? More attention to teaching quality in the “preparation, selection, and assessment of faculty,” for one thing. Better working conditions for non-tenure-track professors, for another.

You can read the full report here. A separate paper from the commission that takes a deeper look at improving undergraduate teaching is available here.

Thanks for reading. If you have suggestions or ideas, please feel free to email us, at dan.berrett@chronicle.com, beth.mcmurtrie@chronicle.com, or beckie.supiano@chronicle.com.

—Beckie and Dan

Teaching & Learning
Beckie Supiano
Beckie Supiano writes about teaching, learning, and the human interactions that shape them. Follow her on Twitter @becksup, or drop her a line at beckie.supiano@chronicle.com.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
  • Explore
    • Get Newsletters
    • Letters
    • Free Reports and Guides
    • Blogs
    • Virtual Events
    • Chronicle Store
    • Find a Job
    Explore
    • Get Newsletters
    • Letters
    • Free Reports and Guides
    • Blogs
    • Virtual Events
    • Chronicle Store
    • Find a Job
  • The Chronicle
    • About Us
    • DEI Commitment Statement
    • Write for Us
    • Talk to Us
    • Work at The Chronicle
    • User Agreement
    • Privacy Policy
    • California Privacy Policy
    • Site Map
    • Accessibility Statement
    The Chronicle
    • About Us
    • DEI Commitment Statement
    • Write for Us
    • Talk to Us
    • Work at The Chronicle
    • User Agreement
    • Privacy Policy
    • California Privacy Policy
    • Site Map
    • Accessibility Statement
  • Customer Assistance
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise With Us
    • Post a Job
    • Advertising Terms and Conditions
    • Reprints & Permissions
    • Do Not Sell My Personal Information
    Customer Assistance
    • Contact Us
    • Advertise With Us
    • Post a Job
    • Advertising Terms and Conditions
    • Reprints & Permissions
    • Do Not Sell My Personal Information
  • Subscribe
    • Individual Subscriptions
    • Institutional Subscriptions
    • Subscription & Account FAQ
    • Manage Newsletters
    • Manage Your Account
    Subscribe
    • Individual Subscriptions
    • Institutional Subscriptions
    • Subscription & Account FAQ
    • Manage Newsletters
    • Manage Your Account
1255 23rd Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20037
© 2023 The Chronicle of Higher Education
  • twitter
  • instagram
  • youtube
  • facebook
  • linkedin