Making Sense of Your Course Evaluations

Earth Educators Rendezvous 2024

Cody Kirkpatrick

Indiana University-Bloomington

Write down one word…

• Opening activity: what’s the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear phrases like “student evaluations of teaching?”
• Write down one word or phrase (4-5 words at the most)
• We’ll share out in just a moment

For inspiration and organization of today’s content, major thanks go to:

Dr. Lisa Kurz, IU Center for Teaching & Learning

Dr. Katie Metz, IU Kelley School of Business

INDIANA UNIVERSITY

“Why should I care about student voices?”

“Why should I care?”

• Student feedback does still matter for promotion and job security at most campuses ☹
• But it’s more than that
• Continually refine your craft
• Can demonstrate the value of your teaching
• Builds rapport: students as stakeholders
• Effectiveness of your course structure & content (through the students’ eyes)

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“When should I NOT care about feedback?”

Known issues with student evaluations

• Biases against:
• Women, especially younger and/or smaller stature
• Faculty of color
• International faculty
• Low (or no) correlation with student learning
• Sources?
• There are dozens (links on our workshop page)
• “Okay, so what? How do I deal with that?”

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Teaching items that are non-negotiable

• Active learning vs. lecturing: “Just tell us what we need to know”
• When / where the class is scheduled to meet
• “Create a study guide for exams”
• Maybe these…
• “The textbook is boring”; “Topic X is boring”; “the exams are unfair”

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Identifying things to work on

“Based on the feedback

I’ve been given in the past,

I know I consistently

excel at …”

​

Name two items.

Take 2 minutes to reflect on your own (and write down for future reference!) …

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Example short-term goal

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“Increase rigor in my Financial Reporting Class without giving individual exams”

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Example long-term goal

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“Find an effective method for organically incentivizing consistent attendance

but without taking attendance”

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“Over the next year

(short-term), I would like to improve most on _____.”

​

Name ONE item.

Take 2 minutes to reflect on your own (and write down for future reference!) …

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“Over the next two years (long-term), I would like to improve most on _____.”

​

Name ONE item.

Take 2 minutes to reflect on your own (and write down for future reference!) …

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Reflecting on qualitative feedback

I realized I needed a short-term change

1. Example from a recent course of mine
2. Large (n=120) Gen Ed course, very few science majors
3. Written feedback showed students were frustrated
4. Categorized one set of eval’ns, for two consec. semesters (”descriptive coding”)
• Homework: harsh grading, unclear criteria, “no idea what I did wrong” (14 of these comments!)
• Exams: “difficult,” “challenging,” “hard,” “not long enough for their importance” (15 of these comments!)

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Two interventions for the next year

1. Homeworks
• Worked with AIs to create a detailed grading rubric for each homework
• Norming sessions with AIs/graders before grading each homework
• Shared that rubric with students
2. Class sessions (to prep for exams)
• We worked more practice/examples of high-level Bloom’s questions in class (Apply & Analyze)

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The results

“How effectively did out-of-class work (assignments, readings, practice, etc.) help you learn?”

• Before: 3.0 / 4
• --------------------------
• After: 3.4 / 4
• After: 3.4 / 4

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“How clearly were course learning goals and objectives communicated�to you?”

• Before: 3.5 / 4
• --------------------------
• After: 3.7 / 4
• After: 3.8 / 4

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Example 1: “What did you like least…”

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Reflecting on numerical feedback

Example 2: if you saw this data…

1. What questions would you want to ask this instructor in ESCI 101?

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Example 3: GEO 101, always ~50 students

1. The question is “How well did your instructor emphasize student learning?”
2. What advice would you give this instructor?

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When summarizing your own stats…

1. Tell your story – what you do, why you do it, why it works, what you’ve improved on

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• You are not trying to explain away every blip or data hiccup

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• Comparisons outside yourself are dangerous

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• Create an overall context to demonstrate you are a thoughtful, reflective, evolving academic

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Thought & work time for you…

Time for you to think… (option 1 of 2)

1. Think about one of the things you said you wanted to improve on

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• Do you already have the data that demonstrates a need for this change?

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• If so, woo hoo! Now think about how you’re going to implement your change

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• Work for the next several minutes on your own

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Time for you to think… (option 2 of 2)

1. Think about one of the things you said you wanted to improve on

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• Do you already have the data that demonstrates a need for this change?

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• If not, no worries! What data should you collect to demonstrate the need?

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• Work for the next several minutes on your own

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Remember the goal here…

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By collecting student data, and acting on it, �you are demonstrating that your teaching is reflective and evidence-based. Critical for promotion!

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What questions do you have?