Course Evaluations

Key Links

• Choose courses to evaluate (Course Chooser)
• Follow the progress of your course evaluations
• Read completed course evaluations

Full-Time Faculty

While faculty are encouraged to have students evaluate all of their courses for formative purposes, courses of all faculty members are to be evaluated regularly for summative evaluation purposes as described in Section 3.9.2.3 of the Faculty Handbook as follows:

a.     At least two, but no more than three, courses for tenured members. 

b.     Three, and only three, for all others, at least one being a lower-level and one being an upper-level course, insofar as the individual’s schedule permits.

c.     Two evaluations are required during an academic year containing a leave.

All required evaluations should be of courses for which you receive teaching load credit. Tutorials may be evaluated but should be done as an additional third course for tenured faculty members.

The approved online evaluation form and system must be used. Course evaluations are filled out electronically by students in your class following an automated invitation. Results will be made available to you electronically through this secure website. Some departments have received approval from the FPC to use a second form; it must be used in addition to the standard form.

If you want to survey more than those allowed by this system, in order to obtain more feedback for your own information, we suggest that you consider designing and administering your own evaluation, enlisting the aid of your student board, or using a printed copy of the standard online evaluation (PDF version). Note that the PDF version does not include text box responses for each of the prompts with Likert-scale responses. You may want to add these if you opt to use this form.

Course evaluation results will be made available electronically through this secure website. The results, in combination with other measures of effective teaching (e.g., peer evaluations, self-assessment, syllabi, other course resources, etc.), are considered as a point of reference to assist in the evaluation of a faculty member’s overall teaching effectiveness. Student evaluations of teaching are not to be used in isolation. Rather, evaluators will take due consideration in interpreting trends across multiple courses/semesters when referencing student evaluation scores during the teaching performance evaluation process.

Part-Time Faculty

The course evaluation requirements for part-time faculty are described in the following sections: Instructors - Section 4.3.1.3, Lecturers - Section 4.3.2.3, and Senior Lecturers - Section 4.3.3.3. All courses taught by part-time faculty are automatically selected for evaluation. The approved online evaluation form and system must be used. Course evaluations are filled out electronically by students in your class following an automated invitation. Student course evaluation results will be made available to the faculty member, Department Chair, and the Faculty Personnel Committee, as well as the Provost and President as part of their respective participation in faculty evaluations.

Selecting Courses to be Evaluated

Only full-time faculty are required to select the courses students will be asked to evaluate. It is the faculty member’s responsibility to select the correct number and type of courses to be evaluated. See the sections above for the relevant requirements. Selections can be made at the Course Chooser website. This is a personalized website that will list all the courses a faculty member is scheduled to teach for the academic year. Courses are selected by clicking the checkbox next to the course to be evaluated. Courses must be selected by the following dates and times.

• Fall 2023 First Module Courses: Tuesday, October 3, 2023 at 11 p.m. (EDT)
• Fall 2023 Second Module Courses: Sunday, December 3, 2023 at 11 p.m. (EDT)
• Fall 2023 Full Semester Courses: Sunday, December 3, 2023 at 11 p.m. (EDT)
• Spring 2024 First Module Courses: Tuesday, February 27, 2024 at 11 p.m. (EDT)
• Spring 2024 Second Module Courses: Tuesday, April 23, 2024 at 11 p.m. (EDT)
• Spring 2024 Full Semester Courses: Tuesday, April 23, 2024 at 11 p.m. (EDT)

It is not possible to make changes to selections after these dates and times. Therefore, it is critical that faculty make appropriate selections before the deadlines above.

*Please note: All Summer courses are automatically selected for evaluation.

Evaluation Periods

Evaluations will be administered during the last five class days of the term. Course evaluations may not be administered during final examinations. Course evaluations will be available to students according to the following schedule:

Session	Start	End
Fall 2023 First Module Courses	Wednesday, October 4, 2023 at  12:01 a.m.	Tuesday, October 10, 2023 at 11:59 p.m.
Fall 2023 Second Module Courses	Monday, December 4, 2023 at 12:01 a.m.	Friday, December 8, 2023 at 11:59 p.m.
Fall 2023 Full Semester Courses	Monday, December 4, 2023 at 12:01 a.m.	Friday, December 8, 2023 at 11:59 p.m.
Spring 2024 First Module Courses	Wednesday, February 28, 2024 at 12:01 a.m.	Tuesday, March 5, 2024 at 11:59 p.m.
Spring 2024 Second Module Courses	Wednesday, April 24, 2024 at 12:01 a.m.	Tuesday, April 30, 2024 at 11:59 p.m.
Spring 2024 Full Semester Courses	Wednesday, April 24, 2024 at 12:01 a.m.	Tuesday, April 30, 2024 at 11:59 p.m.
Summer 2024 Five-Week Courses	Thursday, June 13, 2024 at 12:01 a.m.	Wednesday, June 19, 2024 at 11:59 p.m.
Summer 2024 Ten-Week Courses	Thursday, July 18, 2024 at 12:01 a.m.	Wednesday, July 24, 2024 at 11:59 p.m.

Procedure to Administer

At the start of the evaluation period, students will receive automated invitations to complete evaluations for the courses full-time faculty have selected to be evaluated and for all courses taught by part-time faculty. They will also receive periodic reminders if they do not complete an evaluation. Full-time faculty need to select the courses to be evaluated. Part-time faculty do not need to do anything.

All faculty should inform their students that they will receive this invitation and encourage them to complete their course evaluations during the evaluation period. When communicating with students, it might be valuable to inform them that you will never see the evaluation forms, only the numerical summaries and the comments.

Faculty can monitor response rates for the evaluations in their courses at the EvaluationKit website. If your response rates are below 80%, you might consider sending a reminder to your students or allocating class time to complete the evaluations.

Improving Response Rates

The response rate for course evaluations was near 85% when they were administered in class via paper forms. This is the response rate we wish to achieve now that evaluations are distributed electronically. High response rates provide more comprehensive information to you and to the Faculty Personnel Committee.

Faculty can monitor response rates for the evaluations in their courses at the EvaluationKit website. If your rates are below 80%, there are a few things you can do to help increase them:

• Remind students that you value their feedback, care about creating excellent educational experiences, and that course evaluations help you to reflect on your teaching and improve courses for future students. 

• Consider setting aside time during a class meeting to complete evaluations. Since the evaluations are online, prompt students to bring their electronic devices to class on evaluation day. Then, as we did when evaluations were on paper, leave the room to allow the class to complete them. 

• If you choose to do the evaluations outside of class time, send reminders to your students about the evaluations. 

Reading Course Evaluations

Course evaluations will be available for faculty to read shortly following the due date for grade submission. Evaluations can be read on the Course Evaluation website. Please look for an email from Academic Affairs about when Course Evaluations are available to be viewed.

Course Evaluation Form

A PDF version of the online evaluation form can be downloaded if you would like to review the prompts presented to students through the online evaluation system. Please do not use this form to evaluate your courses as part of the official course evaluation process.