End-of-Semester+Course+Evaluations

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= End of Semester Course Evaluations =

**Course evaluations are part of Stevenson University's commitment to excellence in teaching and learning, and are done online through a system provided by EvaluationKIT and administered through Stevenson's Office of Institutional Research and Assessment. The online system is easy, convenient, secure, anonymous and confidential. It is crucial that you communicate the importance of course evaluations to your students and employ techniques to ensure a high response rate. (See below section Increasing Response Rates.) **


 * BLACKBOARD :** One of the reasons that EvaluationKIT was selected is its ability to integrate with Blackboard. Faculty can easily access response rates (even during the evaluation open period) and obtain evaluation results by signing in to Blackboard and clicking on the box on the left called, My Course Evaluations. It is important to know that, because EvaluationKIT works through Blackboard, your course Blackboard sites must be turned on. If you do not use your Blackboard site and do not turn it on, it will be turned on for you before the end of the semester so that students can complete their evaluations.


 * WHERE AND WHEN DO STUDENTS GET THE COURSE EVALUATIONS? **Course evaluations are available to students two weeks before finals week for traditional semesters. Course evaluations close to students the day before finals begin. Students receive an email before the evaluations open to let them know it will soon be time to complete the evaluations. Students then receive an email the day the evaluations open to them. This email contains a link that will take students directly to their evaluations to complete.


 * WHAT ABOUT NON-RESPONDENTS? **Non-respondent students will get a reminder email approximately every day during the open period. Faculty who have non-responders in their class will also get reminder emails.


 * FACULTY REPORTS: ** Instructors can check response rates on Blackboard throughout the process before evaluations have closed to students, as long as there are at least 2 respondents. Approximately two weeks after the semester ends, faculty can access course evaluation reports through the Blackboard link, My Course Evaluations. You will get an email letting you know when the reports are available. It is STRONGLY recommended that you download and save your evaluation reports. (Copies are NOT kept electronically or otherwise by the Office of Institutional Research and Assessment.)


 * WHERE IS MY EVALUATION? **You sign into Blackboard and click on My Course Evaluations but your class isn't there! This may be becasue either your response rate was below 35% or there were less than 5 students enrolled in your class. (Anonymity may be compromised if under 5 students so courses with low enrollments are generally not evaluated.)


 * A LITTLE ABOUT RESPONSE RATES: ** The system will not release evaluation reports if the response rate of your class was less than 35%. (Anything under 65% may not be a good representative sample and should still be viewed cautiously.) WHY? Respondents are self-selected. The goal of a representative sample is to have the sample be as much like the entire population of the class as possible. Typically, the students who do complete the evaluations are either the ones that liked the class the most or the ones that liked it the least. Also there is evidence that shows that females respond more often than males and that the "best" students respond more often than lower performing students. Any open-ended questions are even more open to bias as usually only students who feel that they have something important to them to say will respond.

**INCREASING REPONSE RATES:** There exists the perception that online course evaluations always result in a lower response rate than paper evaluations done in class. This is not true as evidenced by the fact that numerous Stevenson departments and individual instructors consistently achieve high response rates.

Probably the most effective way to increase response rates is by developing and nurturing a culture of assessment of teaching and learning. Students are much more likely to respond when they feel that they are an important part of this culture; and when they are convinced that their feedback is important and is actually used to facilitate improvement and change.

**Some proven ways to engage students in the process and increase response rates include:**


 * Remind students that they are entered into a drawing if they complete their evaluations to receive any one of numerous gift cards.


 * Include the evaluation open period (2 weeks before finals) on your syllabus. Ask students to look for the emails from assessment@stevenson.edu.


 * Talk to students often and early about the importance of course evaluations.


 * Explain to students specifically how you use the data they provide. Let them know you take their responses very seriously.


 * Make course evaluations an assignment - put the course evaluation with due date on syllabus, and deduct points if not done (OIRA can provide a list of students who have not completed their evaluations).


 * Assure students that their responses are completely confidential (students can contact OIRA if they need more information about confidentiality) and you have no access to them.


 * Reserve the use of a computer lab during the two week time period that the course evaluations are open and take students to lab to complete.


 * Ask for a show of hands every class asking who has completed them and ask the others to please complete them asap.


 * Give additional points to students who complete their evaluations, or additional points to everyone in the class if the class response rate is above a certain percentage.


 * Give students early feedback on or early access to grades.


 * Any other special consideration or perk the instructor would like to provide to those who complete them or to the whole class if response rate above a specified percentage.


 * Provide students with a copy of the evaluation report and/or last semester’s reports and talk to them about changes you have made based on student feedback from last semester’s evaluations.


 * Provide guidance to students on how to give constructive feedback and comments.


 * NOW WHAT? **The general idea behind course evaluations is to use them to improve teaching and to document teaching effectiveness. The Faculty Response to Student Evaluation Data form is used to address course evaluation ratings and should be completed and submitted to your direct supervisor. The form can be found on the Stevenson.edu website in the Faculty Evaluation Materials section of the Center for Excellence in Teaching site. Course evaluations are only one part of faculty evaluation and of your teaching/promotion portfolio.

Click here to see the questions on the course evaluation instrument. If you have any questions about the course evaluation process, please contact the Office of Institutional Research and Assessment at 443-334-2831.