Tips from the AEJMC Teaching Committee
Finding Success with Student Evaluations
By Natalie T. J. Tindall, Ph.D., APR
AEJMC Standing Committee on Teaching
Associate Professor
Department of Communication
Georgia State University
(Article courtesy of AEJMC News, March 2015 issue)
If I had 100 professors and graduate students in a room and asked, “How many people enjoy reading student evaluations?” I doubt that even 10 hands would shoot into the air. Student evaluations are a necessary evil (or delight, depending on your mood or stance) of the academic life. The National Communication Association’s biennial survey of communication chairs found that student evaluations of teaching were the most recognized and important factor in promotion and tenure evaluations.
Beyond the surface of the evaluations lie some serious concerns of bias toward certain faculty members and toward the instructors of particular classes. Scholars have noted a gender gap in teaching evaluations, biases against professors of color and deflated scores for those professors with accents. Professors teaching large lecture classes often receive lower scores and negative feedback than those who are teaching smaller courses.
These structural issues regarding student evaluations cannot be ignored or glossed over. However, we have to contend with the micro level evaluation and implementation of these evaluations. Student evaluations—the good, the bad, and the ugly words and scores assigned to your course—can cause even the best teachers to gnash their teeth, lament their futures and start looking at the want ads for another line of work. What can a professor do to deal successfully with the scrutiny? What can instructors learn from the feedback? Here are a few tips:
Find a time and location where you can digest the evaluations without interruptions.
Understand the teaching expectations for your department and your university. Did you fall below or land above those numbers?
Pay attention to the comments. “Student comments provide valuable data about the students’ experiences,” wrote Phillip Stark in a blog post. Review the qualitative comments thematically. Search for common themes among the responses. Alan Goodboy points out several potential themes for negative feedback: unfair testing/assignments, unfair grading, classroom policies, violating the syllabus, lack of expectation and structure for group work or teams. If you see clumps of these emerge in the student feedback, a change in approach may be necessary.
Know that you aren’t alone if you get bad feedback. Every professor does not receive glowing recommendations and comments from every student.
Consider the context of the semester. Consider what else was happening in your professional and personal life this semester. Are you starting a new job on a new campus? Was this the first time teaching the course? Is this your first time teaching? Analyze your own experiences and determine if these may have had an influence on the class.
Separate personal attacks from honest concerns about the course content. I once had a teaching evaluation that claimed “my feet were too big for my body.” Thanks, anonymous student, but I can’t do much about genetics. That feedback was not useful at all, but it was one personal attack buried in a plethora of thoughtful, nuanced comments from students who wanted the class to be better. Comments from students about the order and flow of the class may sting and feel personal, but they are not. Many of these things can be adjusted the next semester. Shoe size, alas, cannot. (Note: If you receive any racist, sexist, abusive, and threatening student feedback, report those to appropriate university officials.)
Take control of the evaluation process. As professors, we have the agency to collect insight from students along key points in the semester. Do not wait until the end of the year to hear what your students think. Gather this at key semester points. During your next semester, try one or all of the following.
● Explain the intention, purpose and importance of the end-of-class evaluations.
● Ask a trusted colleague to observe your class and provide constructive feedback. Slate’s Rebecca Schuman offers an important caveat regarding peer teaching evaluations: “‘[get a] peer who actually cares about teaching in the first place—or doesn’t want to sabotage you.”
● Use your college’s teaching and learning center resources.
● Ask your students about their teaching pet peeves. Pass out index cards to students on the first day of classes and ask each student to write down any complaints regarding teaching behaviors. This anonymous feedback can be shared with professors to pinpoint pedagogical issues, not particular faculty members. This insight may help you modify and change the class, your delivery style or homework assignments. (This is based on Perlman and McCann’s article.)
● Build ongoing evaluations into the class structure to check the pulse of the class. These evaluations can be informal minute papers where students capture the one “big idea” from the lecture and address any questions they have or a “muddy points” exercise, where students write (without names) what topics in the class lecture or discussion were not clear.
After reading these tips, most people would still fail to raise their hands if asked if they are looking forward to student evaluations with joy and enthusiasm. But as Natscha Chtena noted in a ProfHacker post on evaluations, “Whether you’re for or against them, evaluations do matter, and it’s important to keep an eye on them.”
Citations:
Goodboy, A. K. (2011). Making Sense of Students’ Complaints, Criticisms, and Protests. Communication Currents. Retrieved from http://www.natcom.org/CommCurrentsArticle.aspx?id=1042
Perlman, B. & McCann, L.I. (1998). Students’ pet peeves about teaching. Teaching of Psychology, 25, 201-202.
Schuman, R. (2014). Needs assessment. Slate. Retrieved from http://www.slate.com/articles/life/education/2014/04/student_evaluations_of_college_professors_are_biased_and_worthless.html
Stark, P. (2013). Do student evaluations measure teaching effectiveness? Retrieved from http://blogs.berkeley.edu/2013/10/14/do-student-evaluations-measure-teaching-effectiveness/
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