Student participation in course evaluations is still disappointing administrators after three semesters of online surveys, they said.
Only 61 percent of students filled out online course evaluations at the end of last semester, Provost Nariman Farvardin said. Since the beginning of online evaluations, no more than 63 percent of students have filled out the form, despite administrators bombarding students’ e-mail inboxes with reminders and offering incentives to do so.
“The system is primarily designed to benefit the students,” Farvardin said. “If the students don’t tell me where the problem is, we won’t be able to make adjustments.”
The administration has said if more than 70 percent of a class fills out the evaluation, the results of the evaluation will be posted online, an incentive designed to convince students to spend time filling out the evaluations.
And during last semester’s evaluation period, the provost’s office was sending out daily reminders to students who hadn’t filled out the evaluations. But the e-mails apparently had little impact on students’ habits.
Students offered a variety of reasons for not completing the evaluations, from lack of time to lack of interest to confusion about the process.
“You have to go onto the website,” said senior biological engineering major Harding Hall. “It’s not a lot of extra time, but when you’re busy, it is.
“I only fill them out if I have strong feelings – if I really like the class or I don’t,” he added.
Farvardin said while students fill out paper evaluations in class, the online evaluations include questions related to the college and university, while paper evaluations are distributed throughout the department. He said he would like to eventually shift the department questionnaire online, as well.
Despite the lower-than-hoped turnout, Farvardin said the university is still trying to improve the program, through talking to deans and professors about encouraging students to fill out the online forms. The goal, he said, is for 70 percent of students to fill out evaluations.
“Every semester, we have improved the system,” Farvardin said. “We will continue to do that until the system is satisfied.
“Professors have a special influence on the students,” he added. “We want to make sure [course evaluations] become a culture of our institution.”
While Farvardin emphasized how the evaluations help students, university President Dan Mote said evaluations were even more helpful for administrators.
“Generally, students think about them in terms of helping other students,” Mote said. “But actually, it’s most helpful for the department and the instructor. They improve our courses without a doubt. I would encourage the students to do them – now that it’s on the Internet, it seems like it would be easier, I would think. Students could help us understand why they don’t do it.”
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