By Maggie Biunno
All semester students are judged by their professors, and as they wait for the results of their labor, they finally get the opportunity to do some criticizing of their own.
Most students fill out the little bubbles of the teacher evaluation form, unsure of their purpose, but eager to waste class time.
In the 1960s, the University began to integrate a professor evaluation system that has evolved into the current system. The University made this evaluation process mandatory in 1974.
Over time some specific questions have been changed, but the basic approach used now remains the same since the last revisions in 1986 and 1987.
But what exactly happens after you use your golf pencil and evaluate your professor?
The envelopes are dropped off in Davison Hall and with the help of temporary workers hired by the University, the calculations begin. Liora Schmelkin, vice provost for Academic Affairs, organizes and oversees the whole evaluation process.
“We hire the temps each year so the results are objective,” Schmelkin said.
She also explained how the quantitative data, which is fill-in-the-bubbles form, goes through a computer program to process the data crunching aspect of the evaluation task. But in the end, all the results return to her office.
There are three uses for these forms at the University. First, and probably the most obvious, is that the results provide feedback to the instructors.
The comment sheets and the results of the bubble forms are not returned to the professor until the beginning of the next semester-so students have no reason to worry about an instructor recognizing their handwriting and as a result receiving a bad grade, Schmelkin said.
Students have the opportunity to tell the professors what they think worked well and which of their policies were not quite so fair.
Because everyone has a different level of ability at taking tests and schoolwork, professors will not know how their teaching skills are working unless students tell them.
“There are certainly some conflicts in our ideas, because students and teachers don’t always agree on what makes a ‘good’ professor,” Amy Armenia, assistant professor of sociology, stated. “Some of the things that I feel strongly make for better learning, like being a tough grader, are going to meet with some resistance from students. However, for the most part, I think that students are fair and thoughtful when they fill out those forms.”
Professors are able to take comments in different perspectives and use them to benefit the classroom for the following semesters.
“I do know that it is impossible for me to please all of the students all of the time,” Armenia continued. “I have to have some idea of what kind of professor I want to be-in my case, I want to be challenging but accessible-and I interpret my evaluations in light of these goals. So, then I don’t mind if students say I’m ‘tough’ but I would be very disturbed if they said I was unfair or unhelpful.”
The next use for these results is for evaluating personnel positions.
The collection of professor evaluation forms accumulated by faculty during their time at the University should accurately represent their teaching skills in the perspective of the students. This aids in the process of assessing professors for tenure.
The professors also have the chance to use positive comment sheets, which are returned to and only seen by the instructor, towards their advancement process.
Different and much more specific than ratings on Web sites such as RateMyProfessor.com, these forms provide meaningful questions that are used over each semester in order to obtain accurate and helpful results.
“I got some value from them,” adjunct assistant professor Peter Goodman stated. He has taken into consideration the comments to use to make his class more successful.
Even though it is stated in the directions on the bubble form, many students do not know or take advantage of the results that are available at the Reference desk in the Axinn Library.
“I think the majority don’t [use the results],” Schmelkin said. “I think it’s important for students to see how other students respond to faculty members. However, keep in mind it is just one semester and one class and the students should look at more than that.”
“I look at Rate My Professor,[.com] but I don’t take it 100 percent seriously because most people that write on it say that professors are bad because they make you read,” sophomore public relations major Kristen Garger said. “In reality, we are in college-did they expect not to read?”
Although RateMyProfessor.com may have some bias, the results are much easier to access.
“I have never taken advantage because I have never known where to go in order to see these results. If the surveys were online, I would definitely check them out,” Franklin Martinez, an undecided freshman, stated.
While the University has the evaluation process down to a science, students ultimately determine the results. This can lead to flaws.
“I would be careful in considering that many students don’t really care when they fill them out, so sometimes they just fill in the circles to finish fast. So the results may be flawed.”
Many students said their professors do not announce the benefits or explain the process of teacher evaluation forms, leaving many students to not take them seriously or fill them in at all.
And while they know that all students fill out the forms, it is not as commonly known that professors evaluate the class, as well, which helps to tabulate the class results.
With more knowledge of this system, students will hopefully opt to take these surveys more seriously, giving themselves and others the best possible information when it comes time for picking courses and professors.