Making the Most of Student Evaluations of Teaching

When I began my teaching career two decades ago as an adjunct instructor, I cared a lot about my end-of-course student evaluations—but quite frankly—they mostly served as a means to job security. Over the years, I came to value my students’ opinions as a way to improve my courses and teaching for future students. However, I was often frustrated with the evaluations I received, because it was rare to find a constructive or useful comment.

As you likely know, student evaluation of teaching (SET) has become a highly-charged and controversial topic in higher education. Not only has research unearthed evidence of factors that contribute to evaluation bias of individual faculty, but also by course level and discipline. As a result, long-standing concerns about how student evaluations of teaching are used in personnel decisions are growing even louder.

So, do student evaluations of teaching have any value to instructors?

In Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher, Stephen Brookfield argues that we grow as educators when we engage in critical reflection of our teaching through multiple lenses or perspectives—one of which is our students’. When properly interpreted, SETs can provide valuable insight into students’ experiences in our courses—information that can be hard to collect otherwise. That said, to get the most from our student evaluations, we need to improve both the quality of feedback we receive from them, and the way in which we respond to them. Here are some strategies to help students do a better job providing constructive feedback, as well as ways we can analyze their feedback to improve the teaching and learning process.

Teach students how to provide effective feedback

Preparing students to be more effective and objective evaluators of teaching helps improve the quality of feedback that they provide. First, let students know that you read their student evaluations and take them seriously. Encourage students to include specific and constructive feedback such as aspects of the course and/or instruction that helped them learn. Overall, make sure students understand ways that you plan to use their feedback to improve the course for future students. Consider implementing the following strategies.

1. Provide students with examples of useful feedback. Students may not know what is helpful and what is not. Give students examples of targeted comments that you have found helpful in the past. Before they complete SETs, remind them to be specific, give supporting examples, and most importantly, explain why they feel the way they do.
2. Explain to students exactly how you plan to use their feedback. Share examples of what you have changed previously as a result of student feedback. Are you already thinking about making a change in the future? Ask them to weigh-in. Don’t forget, you may also want to let them know what elements of the course you can and cannot change.
3. Use strategies to improve your student response rates. If it hasn’t been automated in your college yet you can add a link to the SETs on your course’s Blackboard site. Alert students when evaluations are first available and send them a reminder when the deadline to submit is close. Share the goal of a 100% response rate and invite them to help you reach this goal. If you teach in-person or synchronously online, it also helps to reserve some class time for students to complete evaluations on their mobile devices.
4. Implement mid-course feedback or evaluations. Set up a brief 3-5 question survey using Qualtrics or Google Forms and ask students to complete it around week 4 or 5. This strategy gives you an opportunity to learn where students are experiencing pain points in the course, make adjustments before the course is over, and to let students know you have made adjustments where possible. Students will also learn that you value their input and get practice providing constructive feedback. If you ask the right questions, it’s also an opportunity for students to reflect on their own performance in the course, not just yours.

Reflect on students’ feedback objectively

Let’s start by acknowledging that this is not an easy task. However, the most effective way to use evaluations to improve our teaching is to remove defensive or visceral reactions to student feedback. Although it seems like an impossible exercise, here are some strategies that may help.

1. Give it some time. You may not want to wait too long after the course is over to review student feedback, but perhaps at least a few days. When you’ve had a chance to take a deep breath and feel ready to review student evaluations, make sure to give yourself enough time for a thorough review. Read through the evaluations once, then go back a second time in order to better digest and analyze the information.
2. Track feedback quantitatively. How many students are commenting about the lectures? How many are commenting about the discussions? How many are positive? Negative? Often faculty get stuck on one negative comment and forget that there were many other positive remarks. At the same time, if you see a common theme emerging from students it is clearly an area that should be addressed.
3. Read evaluations as if they were not yours. This is a great strategy if you tend to take student feedback personally or get defensive. Ask yourself: What if this feedback was about a colleague? What advice would you give them? How would your response be different?
4. Don’t panic; get support! All instructors receive negative feedback at some point in their careers, including the very best! Schedule an appointment at the Teaching and Learning Center for a consultation to help you interpret your evaluations. Teaching consultants can help you make meaning of student feedback and provide another perspective. Some research suggests that instructors who discuss their evaluations with a colleague are more likely to have improved evaluations than others who do not discuss them.
5. Reflect and make at least one improvement. Once you have reflected on your student feedback, think strategically about some changes you can make to your course or to your teaching based on the feedback you’ve received. Don’t try to change everything at once and definitely do not change what isn’t broken. Simply, make a commitment to improve something. Then, develop a step-by-step plan for that change.