

Student Evaluations: Feared, Loathed, and Not Going Anywhere - danso
https://chroniclevitae.com/news/1011-student-evaluations-feared-loathed-and-not-going-anywhere

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bsder
If you have to cook evaluations, something is very wrong.

That having been said, allow me to paraphrase the statement I give to my
classes when I teach:

"You're supposed to think I'm fair. You're supposed to think I'm competent.
You're supposed to learn the subject matter. I demand your respect, not your
affection. That's not part of my job description. This entire class can hate
my guts by the end, but if you know the material, I've done my job. Are we
clear?"

Most classes like me, by and large, because I work very hard to be good at
teaching. But not all classes like me. <shrug> So it goes.

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danieltillett
As a former academic who used to go through this game I learned that
evalutions are inversely related to workload. Once I worked how hard I could
push my students I would load up my student to the maximum level possible that
would keep my evaluation just above the minimium I had to maintain.

The thing I always found hard to take was comments along the line that the
whole course was worthless. I never cared if a student personally liked me or
not, but to have a student tell you the subject was worthless made me feel
like I totally failed - luckily I only ever got a few of these comments.

~~~
bdowling
"The student doesn't get to decide what's important."

Never forget that. They can decide if they liked the course or not, if they
liked your teaching or not, but they are simply not qualified to make a
general judgement of its worth.

~~~
danieltillett
This is true, but I always felt that I had been unable to explain to them that
the subject was important. Anyway it is not a problem I worry much over these
days :)

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afarrell
One fundamental problem in evaluating the effectiveness of educators is that
the value of an educational experience is realized a long time after it is
performed.

~~~
henrikschroder
Anecdote: When I started high school, we had a teacher in literature who
everyone just hated. He was harsh, his tests were hard, the subject was
boring, etc. In the third year though, most of us realized that he was very
good at teaching, and the things he taught actually stuck. Many years after
high school, I consider him the best teacher I've ever had.

He never tried to make himself popular, but he was relentless when it came to
teaching. A student evaluation program would have been disastrous for him, and
everyone would have been worse off.

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ams6110
So why not just do the evaluations a year or so later or even more?

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amateurpolymath
At my university it is already hard to get students to fill out the
evaluations (they aren't mandatory but probably should be). Asking them to do
so a year later would result in a near 0 response rate.

Even if evaluations were mandatory, that is no guarantee they will be taken
seriously. A lot of students just "Christmas tree" their evaluations and don't
offer comments.

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zhte415
Make every class a TED talk. It will be hugely impactful for the 15 minutes of
high or buzz that follow. And then little of impact would have been achieved.

Being popular is not important. Getting the job done is.

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Blackthorn
Given that student evals are one of the few tools students have to fight back
against truly horrible and capricious teachers, they need to stay for that
reason alone.

